woulds beyond

my daughter and i were making our way out of the nearby forest(woods but we’ve always called it a forest) and walking down some railroad tracks. i had practice balancing on railroad tracks back in my mom’s hometown of clifton, arizona. but i could never keep it up for really long lengths.
but this time i could have gone on indefinitely. was it something i was doing differently or has my balance changed?

my daughter was commenting on how it would make an interesting picture to take of the tracks. i said “you mean just straight down or the span” and she said “the span.” she has a good eye. it was a neat looking shot. i had been too busy keeping my balance to look up ahead.

to frame the context, these particular tracks are laid down along a path blasted through the rock of the hills. the hills go upwards of three-stories high. my apartment is up at the top of one side of the hills and the “secret” path down across the railroad and into the nearby park (woods/forest) winds along the edge of one of the blasted hills.

it’s a good walk no matter the time of year. it’s a good hike too and you can bring your mountain bike along if you are experienced enough. additionally the river in audience to all of this foliage is a nice winding and deep enough one to go canoeing on, i wouldn’t recommend tubing.

right now the river is low so you can walk on a lot of the bed in the more shallow areas. it reminds me of the many walks me and my cousins and aunts and uncles would take along the colorado river in arizona as well as the other rivers i would visit in arizona. our walks would be in the water and go either up or down the river.

rivers, like many paths we take in life, do not reveal enough at any one point for us to know what may become of our adventure.  in part this makes us fearful but also attracted.  the river will take you quickly down its banks and there is sometimes the quiet times to enjoy the surround, and others you have to focus on the rapid and rock nearby.  this balance in life happens in everything we do, it's just that it is not so obvious like splash and eddy.

the adventure is afoot.  speak and fly into it.