When Frost Settles: Don't Wait Until It's Too Late

 I stepped outside one cold morning and inhaled the crisp air of the late fall season. Most of the leaves had already dropped and covered the yard like a multi-colored blanket. Around the perimeter and scattered across my little acre stretched tall trees; beech, hickory, a few oaks, sugar maples, and other assorted kinds, mostly bare now, but some still retained remnants of their fall colored coatings. Fallen leaves, mostly dried and brittle, crunched under foot as I trod toward the end of the yard and then into the wooded area beyond.

 I weaved my way through the woods, ducking under low hanging limbs, stopping ever so often to examine the evidence of a deer rub where the bark of a three inch thick sapling was scrapped off exposing the brighter under bark of the smallish trunk. 'Must have been a nice buck that made this one...' I thought to myself as I felt along the rough edges of the rub. At the end of the woods, the area opened into a corn field, just stubble now all dry and brown, but casting a subtle and distinct aroma of dried earth and harvested corn stalks.

 I stopped for a moment and took in another deep breath. The chill of the morning continued to hover silently across the landscape, yet I felt warmed now from the walk. It felt good to be there, able and ready to experience the natural world at its best, something my heart and soul needs from time to time, even more now that I am retired. It's when the frost settles across the land that makes all the difference...and winter is not far off where snow will cover these same fields.

For close to 30 years I worked in the high tech, hurried pace of the IT world, and before that spent far too many years following a dead end career that almost broke my spirit. That stretch of years provided a steady living for my family offering a means to an end I'm grateful for, but it was a high price I paid for it. During that time my adventures afield were limited to a few days here and there, a morning, an afternoon, then back at it working on the details of too many high pressure projects with un-realistic deadlines. Not only did I feel stressed, I was stressed, far more than I realized, to the point it began to show. Other friends and even family members noticed, asking my wife if I was okay...I looked really tired and burnt out...which I was. Somehow, I muttered through, one day at a time, often staring out the window day-dreaming about floating in my canoe, or fishing, or camping beside a sparkling set of shoals.

The time eventually came when I was able to retire, a bit early, the circumstances leading up to that moment are not important, but the effect of doing so was. Even so, it took a few years for the stress level to subside, but it eventually did and I began to realize just how much time had slipped by and how little of the adventures I so enjoyed were missed. Even though I've tried to stay in shape and I've done a respectable job of doing so, time and age does catch up. A troublesome hip, more general aches and pains, longer recovery times, well, they all generate a slowing down enough so the level or degree at which I can participate doing the things I enjoy so much has been tempered. Hasn't stopped me, and now I get out more than I ever did when I was younger. Can't push it too hard, but I do push it right up to what I know is my limit, then I back off.

As I stood next to that corn stubble field, the cool morning air hovered around my eyes generating a wind born tear that blurred my vision. Across the way a few deer worked their way along the edges looking up toward me from time to time just to make sure I was no threat. Their once tawny coats were now turning winter gray and the little ones born the previous spring were almost as large as their mothers. Overhead a Redtail hawk screeched as it sailed effortlessly across the field expanse then disappeared beyond the tree line. What had been a brilliant morning sun, suddenly closed down as a bank of darkened clouds moved in and the crisp fall morning became almost cold. 

Later that afternoon, I made my way over to the pond at the far end of that corn field. I sat partially hidden and camouflaged at one end of the pond and in a short time a family of squirrels chased each other through the woods to eventually and cautiously meander down to the pond for a cool drink. They were fun to watch and as silently as I could snapped a few long range photo's of these interesting and energetic creatures. 

As I sat there waiting for the sun to settle toward night, I was thankful to once again have the health and vigor enough to enjoy doing such things, and I was thankful for the time to do them. 

When the frost settles across the land is a special time of year where the seasons mark a dramatic shift toward winter. In previous years I had all but lost contact with such moments and had almost waited too late to enjoy them. I suppose the lesson here is to not allow life to get in the way of living. Don't wait until it is too late, for frost can quickly settle across a persons world, so much so, enjoying the simple things of life are far too often lost over time.