The Healing Woods

Shila and Chet take five. A powerful dynamic duo of positivity, great karma, and healing power, plus bonus cuteness.
Photo by Shila Wilson
Photo by Shila Wilson
Baker demolishes a stick. Good thing he doesn't bite.

Sunday was sunny and warm. O rare moment! Carpe-frickin' diem. Shila called in the morning and I could tell from a note in her voice that, our prior commitments and chaotic houses and all the roughage of life aside, it was high time for a girl-walk. We were both badly in need of being transported from our routines and lifted to a higher plane. We also think we have a calcium and vitamin D deficiency brought on by too little sun. Last winter we walked like crazy, took tons of pictures of tons of ice, and got great workouts on the slopes. This winter, it seemed as though our lives ran us. Where did our walk-time go? Pfffft.
So I picked crap up and swept and cleared the kitchen counters (again) and recycled newspapers and hauled trash and burned papers and put away six loads of clean laundry until Chet announced that his favorite person had arrived. Liam decided he'd like to join us, and we chortled quietly at his running chatter as we kicked through the dry leaves.
Liam has an intrepid streak, but he's still a very careful little guy. I know he'll choose his path well, and I also know he'll sound off if he hurts himself. It's such a delight to watch him stretch his young muscles and explore, taking joy in everything he finds. Until you put a boy next to these rotting ice sculptures in the place we call Beechy Crash, it's hard to appreciate the scale.
Big, big, big. I like places that make me feel very small. So does Liam.
Chet Baker was so very happy to be out with us. He has matured so much in these two years. No longer does he catch a whiff of cow and take off like a streak. "Stay close, now, Baker," is all I have to say to him. And when we are near pastures, I have but to say his name and he comes and sits at my feet, and waits for me to put his lead on. Such a good boy.
It was hot enough to get pants out of Chet, and a wonderful kind smile.
The walk was long enough (four hours of climbing and sliding up and down vertical slopes) to give us a good workout, and make Liam feign death as we climbed the last long hill toward home. He kept asking me if I knew where I was going. You could set me down blindfolded, anywhere in the 320 contiguous acres of woodland around our house, and it would take me about ten seconds to figure out where I was. But I feigned confusion and asked Liam to find the way for us. And he knew, too.
I was proud of my two boys, so happy to be with my best friend, so glad to be in the moment and not in some manufactured time and space of my overactive and weary mind. I stopped to show Liam the sprouting sporangia of mosses on a log, breathing in his sweet boy smell.Photo by Shila Wilson
Baker does not like to see anyone get loving unless he gets some, too. He horned in, Boston-style.Photo by Shila Wilson
And made sure his presence was known.Photo by Shila Wilson
And felt. Licking the lenses always gets a reaction. That's what he's shooting for.Photo by Shila Wilson

Thank God for spring sunshine, warming days, shorter nights, my sweet boy, Baker kisses, and good friends. I for one am glad for earlier daylight savings time. I don't feel like quite such a freak when I wake up at 4:17 AM. 5:17 has a better ring to it. I fell asleep on the steep hillside, nestled in warm beech leaves, half-listening while Shila gave Liam a life quiz. She asked him questions like, "You go into the lunchroom and there's a kid crying there because he doesn't have a lunch. What do you do?"
Liam: "I give him some money and buy him lunch and dry his tears."
Shila: "Correct answer!"
Liam: "Ask me another!"
Shila and Liam and I came back from the walk recharged, and a little better equipped to face the world in the week to come. Baker was already there. He starts out with a charge.
Photo by Shila Wilson