By the brook

Now that the ice has melted on the paths. I’ve been taking walks in the woods along the brook. Lila and I have been going a lot lately, often taking friends with us. It’s an hour to an hour-and-a-half walk, depending how many distractions distract me, how long Lila wants to chase sticks in the water.

A couple of weeks ago on my walk with Lila and my friend Suzanne and her dog, the man who lives in the house by the road at the other end of the path came out to tell us to walk beside his property. He had cleared a path for hikers so that they didn’t have to walk in the mud and slush in the low-lying land near the brook. Nice. The next day when Lila and I walked by that house, he came out and said, Oh, you again. Indeed, me again. Almost every day now. Us lucky dogs.

Last weekend, Sunday to be exact, Lila and I went for our walk in the woods and met some neighbors, also with a dog. We all ended up sitting on another neighbor’s porch, the one with three labs, eating fresh made chocolate chip cookies and playing with the dogs. I went home with a bird feeder my neighbor made. He gave each of us one.

It’s not quite Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood, the show I used to watch with my children when they were young. Besides the chocolate chip cookies, my neighbors were also drinking rum and coke. I just didn’t want any so I didn’t have it. And not everyone here is so very nice. But almost.