A moment in my life
To the Editor,
Dear neighbors, imagine this if you can. Tomorrow, your alarm clock rings. You open your eyes and see that everything is black. You realize that you have become totally blind.
Everything is darker than night, and no images exist. It is morning, and time to take your walk around the beautiful town of Swarthmore. Although you are frightened, you have strolled merrily around the town hundreds of times. You lace up your sneakers and harness up your dog. When you step outside, you notice that it has rained overnight, as your hand grasps the handrail. You step out at your normal active pace, but soon are assaulted by a low hanging branch. You feel irritated that your face has been whacked, but you are also drenched by the water nestled in the branch. Your hair is dripping, your face is shedding water, and your clean shirt is wet, cool, and plastered to your skin. You reach into your pocket for your sunglasses. They will not help you see, but they will protect your eyes from the mean glancing blows of branches. You wish you had a towel to dry your face, and you also wish these kind neighbors saw how low the tree branches bend after it rains. They are at least a foot or two lower.
Yesterday, you could walk cleanly over the pavement, but today, you must intensely focus on not tripping over a raised pavement. If you find a toe catcher, you might fall and plummet to the ground. And today, that happens. As you pull yourself up, you are glad to find you have suffered nothing more than a scraped knee, and grateful you are not as thin as you would wish to be, because you are still whole, without broken bones. As you scoot along, you are instantly forced to call upon your skating prowess as your feet wobble atop acorns. You are thankful for the good neighbors down the street who are more conscious of their oak trees and sweep away this acorn hazard. As you turn the corner to head toward home, your hand lightly brushes a sticker bush or some other thorny horror. And ouch! Your hand has several thorns protruding from your fingers. You try to remove them, but you can’t see, and you can’t pull out the stickers. But you say, “Oh, that is life,” and continue on your way home. You patch up your knees, ice your ankle, and call a neighbor, asking her to get out her tweezers. You will take the same walk tomorrow, because you love your dog, and he or she needs healthy exercise.
Kathleen Faul
Swarthmore
P.S. Thank you for sharing a moment of my life. My dog and I thank you for improving your sidewalks and clipping the hedges, hollies, and low hanging trees. Hello to all the people out there exercising too. You cheer me up with your happy “good mornings.” I apologize if I don’t hear you or don’t respond. Sometimes it’s because I think people are on their phones, or I am just concentrating on a tricky part of the sidewalk.
