Our home rests on a corner of two ‘country’ roads, and on most days I like living close to everything that travels up and down them. Except on a few early mornings when green garbage trucks barrel along like battleships, these roads are agreeable to walkers who stop by with dogs and greetings; we are fortunate to see other travelers too — screech owls, foxes, birds of every color. Pull-in drivers share the news — two bucks seen next to the creek; the neighbor’s horses have escaped again; lost power in the last storm; three inches of rain in the wheelbarrow this morning.
Two day’s ago, lifting a thatch-full of leaves on my rake, my wedding’s best man arrived on one of his looping walks, and we spent 20 minutes catching up. I’ve known him for 38 years, and it is always a delight to see him. We tell each other stories and laugh at all the right places.
Friends matter more than they ever have. Melville was right — their eyes are “the magic glass, the bright hearthstone, the green land.”
