Sooo, eventually I did have to start somewhere... :) Why not hit up a trail? It has a starting and ending point to make it simple. And amazingly, if you want it to, it can go on and on and on and well, as long as you want it too! ...But, that kinda disproves the point huh?
What I'm trying to get at is that what's thrilling about any kind of trail (and there are hundreds of them here!) is that you can choose how long you venture into them!
Your only guide is your senses.
(wow I feel like Mufasa or a yoga instructer saying that)
Sure there may be a small, paved path or a few nailed in boards to place your feet on but they don't really lead to anywhere special. What your'e really following is your smell (the tickle of a flower's aroma, snipets of ripe berries, earthy rain, bear poop.) Yes. Bear Poop. Wait no. That's from a dog. Welcome to the magnificant outdoors.
So. Um.
Moving on.
What is very important during a hike is what you behold with your sight. Green, everywhere! With splashes of colorful petals! Trees waving hello or standing like guardians keeping watch over the unknown. Over the unexplored. If the trees don't block your view of the sky, there's frosted mountains. And beyond them, clouds. From the clouds comes water. But there is already plenty of water beneath you.
D
r
i
p
ping water. Still water. Rushing water. Trickling water. Mucky water. Clear water. If you look closely enough you can see the dew water. And if you look carefully, you'll find flowers so small, bugs probably give them to eachother on Valentines Day. Well, my aunt who's a plant expert can find them. I, on the other hand, get more distracted by other small things. Actually, she finds those small things as well. (She pays very much attention to detail while I, always wide eyed, try to take everything in at once.) And there was one thing she pointed out on this particular trail that I was oblivious too but found myself quite intrigued with.
And this is something you should know about me. I'm very easily entertained with sometimes very wierd, sometimes very gross, sometimes very dangerous, sometimes very dumb looking stuff. And in this case it was a slug... My first idiot reaction was to touch it.
Touch. Long stringy grass. Wet toes. Strong knots of branches. Moist air. And that slug. Huge slug it was! It was a pretty squishy and slimy slug too. Actually extremely squishy and slimy. The slimiest and most gigantic slug I've ever touched! And I can embarrassingly say I have touched a good bit of slugs in my life. Why? Perhaps it's in my DNA to gravitate towards the...whats the word? Unique? Unsure? Unknown? Different? Quirky? Weird? Odd? Let's say I like to investigate.
So I picked up that slug. I lightly held it up and watched it. I saw its eyes hide and then reemerge. Then I saw its underside release slime. Oh you lovely slime. It was slime so lovely it took me a good five minutes to get off one of my fingers! Just one finger! And that slug held on even tighter to me. Perhaps because it was afraid of its life to fall. Or perhaps because it genuinly liked me and was hoping to be friends. I like to think it liked me. My aunt thinks it was a defense mechanism. That it was trying to kill me. Oh well. I'll post the picture she took and you can judge for yourself.
But wait it gets better!
Not long after I said farewell to my new buddy, I came across another one! One equally as slimy but with a totally different color scheme. I almost kissed it I was so happy! (ok and maybe I was little deranged too) My aunt had to remind me it was not a frog. And even if it was, it probably would not turn into a prince. (Sigh.) I guess its good she stopped me. The taste of a live slug is actually something I would not like to experiance. (Finally! Something normal about me!)
Taste. Thankfully we tasted only things that made us say, "Mmmm." Auntie Mary, as I call her showed me plants that are safe to eat. Like the Watermelon Berries where their leaves taste like watermelons. (Go figure.) There are also plants called Dear Hearts that can be used instead of spinich. And I can't tell you how excited I am to eat the berries when they ripen! We also picked Labrodor leaves and made them into tea. But every few seconds picking them we had to stop and listen for bears.
And that brings us to the final sense, sound. Hearing the crunch of gravel or the slush of mud beneath our feet. Birds skipping through the tree tops. Small waves rushing down the rocks. And our laughs filling up the forest. There's just so much to take in.
There was so much chaos, yet so much peace.
My favorite things in which I found most memorable during this particular hike were the ones most sensory. Picking the leaves for tea. Making slug friends. A giant tree that looked like the one Poccahontas spoke to. And just the feeling of pure awe at the magnifisense of the immense life around me.
So, all in all, my adventure in hiking this trail took several hours and we probably only tackled the distance of less than three miles. But it was so much longer. What we took in with every step was worth much more than a simple step on the sidewalk. More than a step in the grocery aisle. Or the steps from one room to the next. Every step we took was filled with life. From our sense of smell to our sense of sight to our sense of touch to our sense of sound and to our sense of taste. So, lesson for today, breathe in, explore, forget the distance, guide yourself, and breathe out. It feels good.
*See slideshow at the bottom right corner of :)
