Once More to the Lake

Yesterday was New Year's Day. I like to have a little time alone outside on New Year's, so I went to the lake. It was, like many things, bittersweet.

Oz and I went to the lake many times. We went the first day we moved in to this new house, to explore the route and let her have a treat/reward for being so good during the move. It seemed impossibly far away then, because we didn't know the route. The one side of the road is all scrub woods, and at that point, there's a fair curve in Lakeway, which means cars become visible pretty quickly, seeming to zip towards us.

Oz hadn't known we had a destination, of course. She was simply happy to be walking. Then we went on and on…a very long time, which in real minutes was about 12. We got to where I started to see gaps in the trees, and then the mouth of the trail, and then the trail itself. Oz, being scent-driven rather than vision-driven, wasn't as focused. She just kept ambling…until we got on the trails, and got to the point where it forked and we could go toward the water.

That section was longer once again, who knows how long? (90 seconds of twists and turns, in real minutes.) Then we were at the water, and it was good. She was jumping up and down, and looking back and forth from me to the water, etc.

That was the first time. Last year, we went to the lake together on New Year's Day. The lack was frozen near the edges, frozen solid enough to walk on in some places. We did, hesitantly, and Oz left little paw scratches across a stretch of it.

Yesterday, I stood alone on a beach that had been reshaped by the winter storms, as it had been last year. I didn't have to wade. I didn't have to splash. I could stay warm and dry. And sad.

Greg