An Ordinary Loop
I have walked thousands of loops in my time. Some were around the mile-long circle we lived when I was younger, others were on the concrete sidewalks in the suburban neighborhood in our past home, and hundreds were around campgrounds and on trails during our lives on the road.
Taking a walk where the beginning and the ending are the same seems pointless. It turns out that it will not ever be, nor has it ever been.
Today, the snow is the kind that sticks to the velcro of my cuffs but not the street. I pick up white flakes as I go but am not burdened by them. They are the jewelry of winter and they would sparkle if there was sun.
The piles reach their icy fingers into the road. Their ice rimes are so fragile they crack at the application of the slightest pressure. They are lovely but every third step I put my foot on the edge just to hear the crunch. In this way they are beautiful both visually and audibly.
Farther up the hill, the flakes fall thicker so my vision is not as reliable as is customary. Although not more than ten lots from my house, I can’t see it. This is comforting because I can believe wildness exists when pitches of roofs aren’t filling the skyline.
“There is evidence I was here but it is scant. My presence has been filled in, my edges have been smoothed. I am a bare memory. ”
I can only tell I’ve reached the top by the leveling of the pavement under my feet. I don’t care for the feeling of envelopment in any other circumstance, but upright in a storm of white flakes it suits me.
A car drives by and the silhouette of a wave appears through the rear windshield. I am expected to reciprocate so I raise my ungloved hand and mimic the gesture. I am unsure if they saw it and feel a tinge of grade school awkwardness if they did not, that my wave went unseen so it was unworthy of being made.
Now comes the time to turn on the busier street. Thirty-five miles an hour is how quickly the cars pass as they eject projectiles of slush from their tires. I turn up the volume on the voice coming from the headphones in my ears so I can hear over the friction of rubber meeting pavement.
When I am on my street again, I see vague imprints of a shoe sole on the flattened piles of snow along the edge of the road. There’s a good chance those indentations are mine as this is a path I take frequently. They could also be from a neighbor. Perhaps both of us shared a bit of earth in temporally distinct universes.
Coming to my driveway, there’s a gentle sadness that this loop is almost over. Then I look down the asphalt and see that the veil of snow has indeed begun to stick. There is a fine layer that has drifted over the lightly pebbled texture of the pavement and there sits my footprint from before. There is evidence I was here but it is scant. My presence has been filled in, my edges have been smoothed. I am a bare memory.
This has happened before. On the beach, the indentations created by my heels and toes were quickly scoured by the water. They were lifted away by the wind and filled the same traces of other footprints in the sandy transition between water and earth.
This has happened before. As I choose to carefully fold the laundry of my children instead of write the line that has been ricocheting around my head for days. As I read to them a story that I love but now will have their presence imprinted on it as well. As other humans permeate me even in the hours they are not in my physical space.
This will happen again. I will be filled and I will fill up others. Both will be good, both will be aching. I will disappear just to make footprints again.
I will leave traces of myself on the street and in the snowbank and hopefully, at the beginning or the ending of the loop, in the hearts of a few fellow humans.
Inspired by events in Snyderville, Utah
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