The Trails Are For Everyone

Lately, I have noticed more people of color on the trails.  That makes me happy.  I’m aware that there are several online groups seeking to get African Americans to walk more and to meet up for hikes.  In the areas where I walk most frequently, there resides a high percentage of Asian Americans.  Both of these groups, based on my casual visual observation, are walking/hiking more on the trails where you’ll often find me.

I recently had a pleasant conversation with a young (to me) African American biker named Dayton at Creve Coeur Park.  He clearly loved the trails as much as I did.  We chatted a bit, with another biker, about the dirt bike trails there and the history of that park based on my knowledge.  That park still has a trolley car footing and barn from the days when it was a summer retreat from the St. Louis heat.  I have memories from my childhood of both the trolley cars and the houses on stilts at Creve Coeur Lake, the only naturally occurring lake in St. Louis County.  The houses and trolley cars are all long gone.

It cheers me that the attraction of the trails speaks to people of All colors.  Historically, trails have been blazed by people of all colors.  Nature knows no favoritism.  The trees and trails welcome all.

Trails Are Busy

Maybe all it takes to get people walking is……a pandemic!

I walked at Castlewood State Park today – a Tuesday – late morning, and the place was buzzing with walkers.  When I was there last Monday, there were park rangers at several areas around the park, clearly monitoring traffic.  As I was leaving about 11:30 that day, the parking lots were being closed and people were being turned away.  That’s kinda sad.

There were people in the creek and people at picnic tables.  But, most people were on the trails, either on foot or on bikes.  How cool is that?  I hate that it has taken a global emergency to get people to the trails.  The good news is that in the St. Louis area, we have great trails available.  It’s my hope that once this crisis is over, folks will remember where those trails are.

The Hidden Life Of Trees

I just finished listening to this book, The Hidden Life of Trees.  Trees do an amazing job of communicating with each other.  They do an amazing job of taking care of humans too.  This book explained some facts I already knew, like the amount of oxygen trees provide.  We couldn’t do without them and they are being cut down far too quickly.

Did you know that a large deciduous tree has leaves with a surface area of 57 square miles or maybe it’s meters (the book was written by a European)!!!  Wow!  That’s a lot of oxygen processing area.  Trees also communicate danger to one another – like when a ‘predator’, say a giraffe, comes along to eat their leaves and they produce an unpleasant tasting chemical to thwart that.  The chemical floats downwind to warn other trees of the same species that there are giraffes in the area and they begin producing the same unpleasant tasting chemical.  Who knew?

My grandmother inspired a love of trees and nature in me, during long summers in rural northwestern Arkansas.  With little else to do besides household chores (They’ll wait.  No one else will do them while we’re gone’, she’d say.) and watch daily episodes of As The World Turns, we’d head off into the wooded hillsides surrounding the small village where she lived to pick berries, to fish in the canal, or just to see what was around the next bend.  We followed trails and blazed trails.  We always had our ‘snake sticks’ but no sunscreen or bug spray.  Had those been invented?  I don’t think so.  I’m a Boomer.

I never enter woods, my favorite place to walk, without thinking of my dear grandmother and those distant summer days.  All those walks and never poison ivy until I was in my late 30’s!  Mosquitoes still don’t like me but I’d never venture out without sunscreen or bug spray.  I really look forward to when my granddaughters are old enough to hike a few miles.

It’s Okay To Take Care Of Yourself

All of your life have you heard words praising someone as ‘selfless’?  Have you heard people talk about how wonderful someone is because they are always thinking of others first?  When you were a child, were you always told that you should let everyone go before you?

Well, that’s not the truth when it comes to your well being.  That’s all lies!  Really.

If you wait for someone else to take care of you, you might be waiting a long, damn time.  As a child, if you had a parent of two or an older sibling who put you near the front of the line, you had it great!  But, as an adult, that’s just not how life works, with rare exceptions.  Even with a wonderful spouse, no one else can do the things for you that need to be done to take care of you so you stay well.

You need to walk or exercise for yourself.  No one else can do it.  You must make time for it.  If you’re really fortunate, you’ll have a partner who will help you organize your life so that you can wedge in the walk.

My advice is to make you a priority.  Make it a priority in your relationship and make it a priority to your kids if you have them.  It teaches a really good lesson.  That you are important and deserving of the time and energy to stay well.

 

When The World Is Too Much….

When the world is too much with you.  I think that’s how the saying goes.  Maybe it was Shakespeare.  Right now, I’m a bit too bummed and a bit too tired to bother looking it up.

Between the Novel (by now, it’s completely lost its novelty!) Corona Virus and isolation and the more recent devastating death of George Floyd, I can barely stand to have the TV on.  After caring for my grandkids all day, today I can’t make myself go for a walk.  So, I made the mistake of turning on the TV.  Bad move.

I know the healing, cleansing power of those walks for me.  I can get the world out of my head and off my shoulders.  I can’t fix the problems but I can put them in the proper perspective in my life.  Because my kids are paranoid that I might catch the virus, I can’t even assist in the clean up on the days after the looting – which seems like something I could do to help in a tangible if tiny way.  But, I bow to their strong requests not to enter the community at this time.

So, I do what I can in my own life to take care of my family, my neighbors, and myself.  For me, that includes hitting the sidewalk – or better yet, the trails.