In a Yellow Wood

        We got away this weekend, the kids and I, just across the state line to Wisconsin for a couple of days in the sunshine. It's a short enough drive with diversions of all types, and we have a few very budget friendly options that fill our time. This trip we shared a hotel room and with two nights of togetherness and quiet, our daytime needed space to stretch our legs and run free. 

Witches Gulch was calling to me and after twenty minutes of driving and navigating, I thought we had found the trail to get there. The littlest one had fallen asleep in the last few minutes on the road and I spent some time cajoling him to wakefulness and then played some nature games to boost the mood. 

        I don't know if there is a better place to be than wandering in the wilderness with my people. One can start a song and the others join in, "can't go over it, can't go through it, gotta go under it." And then we are all challenged to limbo under a branch or clamber around a log, or hop on top of a stump. 

    There is a newer tradition they've adopted in the last few years, one that tickles my pride and makes me smile every time. They ask me to recite a poem for them and I hope they are learning it, line by line, as often as I am saying it at their request. 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Road Not Taken 

BY ROBERT FROST

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    I am certain that I memorized that poem in my tenth grade English course, during those amazing angsty teenage years when words indelibly marked me, in my brain of course and deeper. I suppose this poet ranks in my top five. We have a dog eared copy of a selection of his works in the van and I have found joy in hearing the kids read and recite the seasonal and woodsy stanzas. I think the meaning in this family favorite is not too obtuse; perhaps the kids enjoy the easy visual nature of it when presented with two paths in the woods...but it has provoked delightful and enlightening conversations along the way as well about choices in life and how they view them. 

These moments are everything I hoped for when I was a young mom. 

           I should say that these moments are still precious to me, now have more gravity as a more seasoned parent. This trip we took to the trail casually, much less prepared than I used to be with no map and no guide. The roads diverged early on our walk; there was a bit of a squabble amongst the crew about which path to take. The youngest was still cranky from being woken from nap and insisted we had taken the wrong path, that this one had been "trodden black" already by other hikers. I smiled and took his hand, pressing forward. 

      

This way was a simple decision, on a lovely day, with no other distractions calling my name. 

He provoked a niggling thought for me with that small complaint, though. Which path should we be on? Literally, the wood turned us in a circle and in the best irony, we didn't find the gulch we sought but rather wound an unexpected route straight back to our vehicle.

Figuratively, it feels perhaps like being lost in those woods. There are certainly more paths right now than the two, so many ways we could route ourselves. Trekking into the quiet of nature isn't something that gives me pause with my people right now but I am mulling over the hubbub of the real world and where we are headed next. This summer has plenty of adventures in store and projects in our home and yard. Professionally too, I am certain I have paths to navigate soon and eventually, maybe personal ones to seek out and explore.