March 15, 2021
By Arthur H. Gunther III
No longer are there country lanes in this life, grateful though as one must be for having once traveled in the heady quiet of a summer night, windows open in non-air conditioned car but the heat of July dissipated both by a sun finally down and the hope of youth taking its place in the brightness of a horizon seemingly without limit.
Yet it proves just partially reachable as years pass, mostly because the demands of moving on require practicality for the ordinary of us. Life happens.
No complaints; in fact, grateful again. What flowers bloom in fields where you never expected to be. Much luck, awfully good people, some talents nurtured and opportunities bring a harvest not deserved. Not everyone is so fortunate.
In the night of the passing years, after the hustle and bustle and the required routine are done, the country lanes appear in a flash, and you get the summer evening scent immediately, the hair that is now gone catches the cooler breeze in the hollow. You feel what was for a second — those youthful stirrings before you had to grow up.
Yet you were on the lane once, and as you fall asleep so long after, the car is moving in third gear, the windows open, the summer date over, the goose pimples visible.
Life happens.
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