We climbed a hill on Saturday. It felt good to stretch the legs. There was no great need to climb it, no real goal in doing so. But we had a Saturday morning, and there was a hill nearby. A new friend mentioned recently that she had climbed it with her husband and new baby. She said that the city looked beautiful from the top, so it seemed like a good idea. My kids like to climb hills. And so do I. So we did.
Unless he can persuade us to put him in the sling on one of our backs, Blue is still in a stroller when we go for long walks, and so that’s how he got to the hill. I pushed him and he sat excitedly, expectantly, hugging his stuffed rabbit and watching birds fly overhead. Beangirl ran ahead. Then she let us catch up, and we could see that something was troubling her. She said she couldn’t remember the words to Away in a Manger. Last Christmas was a long time ago. The Spouse asked her how far she could remember, and then the two of them remembered the rest of it together.
When we got to the bottom of the hill, we folded the stroller and pointed the kids up the path. The first stretch cut through the woods. There was gravel underfoot. We could hear it settle as we climbed, a quiet crunch covered over with wet leaves. Every so often, a line of stones formed a step up. The Spouse explained to the kids that the stones directed any running water away from the path, and he showed them the drainage holes off to the side. We decided that it was a cleverly built path.
There were small birds flitting from branch to branch over our heads.
Further on, there was a low wall and blackberries growing in the sunshine. Blackberries in November. Imagine. Legend has it that you aren’t supposed to pick blackberries after St Michael’s Day in September. That was the day that St Michael chased Satan down from heaven. As he fled, he fell into a blackberry bush, and, being awful, he cursed the thorns and spat on the fruit. The scoundrel. But we saw no sign of him – no singe marks at all- so we chanced it and ate the berries. They were delicious.
Further on, the slope opened up before us, stretching on and pulling us higher. Climbing, climbing. We found more prickly bushes, these covered with flowers like yellow flames . A black crow against the green grass and dogs ahead. There was wind. White clouds, the shadow of clouds on the city below. It was a beautiful day.
In the evening, the kids stayed home with a sitter, and the Spouse and I had a date. We went to a performance of Czeslaw Milosz’s poetry set to music and paired with moving images. The musician stood between two screens, flooded in dancing light and projected words. It was overwhelmingly beautiful. Milosz was a Polish poet – a Nobel prize winner and a writer who captures with clarity the fleeting moments. A leg of lamb on a spit. A view of boats rocking in a cove. A doe and a fawn eating flowers in a graveyard. And God as a wanderer, camping beside the water, keeping a small flame to shine a little through the darkness.
His words remained with me.
I stare and stare. It seems I was called for this:
To glorify things just because they are.
