stone days...

On weekends we woke to the smell of frying meat, usually it was Taylor ham or bacon, but sometimes it was this incredible mystery meat from the Scottish butcher.  Whatever it was, it was wonderful and always accompanied by the sound of John Denver from my mother's record player.  
We'd feast.  We'd devour the buttered rolls and the hard to eat, but so worth the effort Crumb-buns bought fresh and hot from the bakery in our town.
After we were stuffed, we'd dress and then ride away in either the big van or the Country Squire.   No matter where we'd end up, be it the base of the local Ramapo Mountains or someplace further, we'd  hike for hours together.
Though we began and ended in a pack, while we walked, spaces developed between us.  It was possible to think differently and clearly in these spaces.  Something about the air, the woods, looking at the sky distorted by tree tops, seeing sun speckles on the ground as light penetrated leaves on branches, shining like a kaleidoscope on the earth around me.   These changes opened me to thoughts that never came while at home in our crowded house.
Though my energy was endless then, the apple breaks were the thing I loved most.  Finding a flat surface or a large boulder near water to stretch out on, everyone stopping to rest a while, the crunch and tartness of piecing the flesh of fresh fruit, an end to my well earned hunger and thirst, sun on my face, breeze in my hair.  Then we'd go further.
As I grew older, I'd do as my ambitious sister had, I'd bravely navigate ahead of the gang and find a place to hide from them.    Waiting in the base of a hollowed tree or mashed between two giant stones, secreted under a pile of leaves, the anticipation of springing out to surprise them would build as I heard voices coming closer.   Sometimes I'd surprise myself, lose the desire to move and instead remain hidden, letting them pass me by, instead spying and noticing them in a way I otherwise might not.  Seeing them as people, not family, taking in their voices, laughter, clothing, the strands of hair, freckles, bright eyes, their individuality and their unity.  They were beautiful.  In some strange way, seeing them apart from me made me miss them.  Seclusion was a rarity, privacy gave perspective.   When they'd pass and a distance formed, I'd run toward them, glad to be close again.
I could feel so alone, but I never was and that is something I know well today.   Now long grown and gone away, I am alone, but not truly.  I'm one of five, which makes it impossible for me to be unconnected, no matter where I am, where I go, how I hide.


Like the words to a song that 
reminds me of waking in my childhood home; "Somedays are diamonds, somedays are stone"... somedays are stone, but I can love the stone days, because of all those diamond days...  I am one of five.