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ONE WAY
Linda Robinson
Pine Loop Trail is a half-mile semicircle of narrow grassed path that beckons from two sites on Aspen Trail in Kensington Park. It is secluded, beautiful and calming.
A walker should be able to step onto the Pine Loop Trail from either point.
I have never been able to do this. Map in hand, carefully following the signs, I step onto Pine Loop Trail from one direction exclusively. No matter how I think I’ve outwitted the map, I come to the Loop one way only.
The first time I walked the Loop was in the autumn, as it is now. Leaves lay spent on the path, brown gold with exhaustion, ready to be transformed. The sun sparkled. As my foot moved from Aspen to the Loop, the wind swept up behind me, the trees wavered like fainting Victorian ladies, and the leaves formed a fragrant wave rustling toward an unseen shore. Unnerved, feeling followed, I spun around to confront the traveler behind. Nothing was there.
The wind stopped.
Midway through the woods that shoulder Pine Loop Trail, I saw a wide swath of mowed grass leading right. I followed the sward upward, having been so sweetly invited. A large rock wore a plaque on its bosom: “This land was once the summer home of George and Virginia Danz and was donated in their memory by the Danz family.”
Sitting on the bench next to the rock, I closed my eyes and felt the sun on my lids and heard the birds singing travel songs, busily planning the long way to winter quarters. I inhaled Eau de Autumn Leaf until I was dizzy with oxygenated happiness. Resting and enjoying, I felt another presence. I opened my eyes, slowly turned my head right. On the edge of the clearing, 20 feet away, an enormous buck looked serenely back.
The wind, the sense of being followed, happened each time I stepped onto Pine Loop Trail. During every rest at the Danz’s homestead, I met another beautiful creature. A chickadee landed on my hand. A chipmunk stood on my toe. A doe and two fawns shared a snack with me. Two hawks waltzed just above the treetops.
Ongoing attempts to enter the woods from a different direction failed. Even if I cannot read a map, I should be able to make sense of three simple well-marked trails. But I would come to the same familiar sign, and walk onto the Danz land, and the wind and leaves and the sense of not being alone would begin.
It was so eerie, I hesitantly mentioned it to my creative coach. “Ask who it is,” she said calmly. “Ask what they want.”
Once I turned and asked, “Who are you? ” No answer. Another spin later and I asked, “Grandma? Is that you?” I finally stopped turning around.
2007 is my third year walking Pine Loop Trail. This past spring, snow still shining patchily in the trees, I stepped into the familiar realm, and no wind came. The old oak leaves lay silent. I stopped amazed, but as I continued my way slowly on the path, winding through Mrs. Danz’s rosebushes gone wild, I understood who I thought had been following me.
2007 is my 10th anniversary of being a cancer survivor. These years have been a long journey through anguish, pain, relief and joy, buffeted by winds of change and waves of grief and hope. Cancer set my feet on the path to recovery, and that path travels one way.
Behind me on the trail, struggling and anxious to catch up was my spiritual self. Without fanfare or fuss, when we learned we were ready, we finally became one.
The path to awareness may be entered from just one direction. Some of us chose to step on the path; and others awake to find the path there. We meet wonderful beings as we step along, and the trees wave at us, and leaves dance at our feet. We rest from the journey inward, and when at peace, we move outward once more.
It no longer interests me that I can’t seem to get into Pine Loop Trail from the opposite direction. I wonder that I ever thought it did.
Linda Robinson is an artist who is still growing up in a small town in beautiful Michigan. Her work may be viewed at "Sweetgrass: A Store to Awaken Your Spirit" in Davisburg, MI, at Thomas Video in Clawson, and on her website at www.58moon.com
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