Four Walks at KSR, Part 4

September 19, 2012. Three days from the fall equinox. I'm just home from a drive to Jokers Hill with Kelley Aitken. We walked for an hour and a half, chilly at first, under a cloudy sky. I think fall is here. The rich greens of summer have faded and the place shows a different palette.

We pulled our jackets round us against a strong and blustery wind and I felt the city blowing out of my head. As we walked the cloud began to break up into huge, fast-moving cumulous bundles, the sky around and between them a brilliant clear blue.

         

It rained heavily last night, cleaning the air and making the edges of things crisp and defined. The land at KSR rises and falls, the road we walked curved past fields now a mix of beiges, golds, purples, often edged with greens.

I wonder at what point of colour the season shifts? There’s a time, often in late August, when the greens go flat, all shine and glossiness gone. Is that the real beginning of fall, the equinox just a symbolic marker we’ve claimed for it?

Kelley and I walked mostly through the open areas, following the road past the lab and around by the pond and climate change research plots. The wind, space, and sky were exhilarating. Where the road became grassy the grass was wet from the night’s rain. Before long our feet were squelching in our non-waterproof hiking shoes, but it didn’t matter—the pleasure of moving through crisp air and wind compensated for wet feet.   

We talked about place and writing, about painting, about time management, about the challenges of getting to what one really wants to do. What a wonderful place to paint! said visual artist and writer Kelley. I add, also a wonderful place to take photographs, or to sit and stare at things from one of the white chairs that composed themselves as a still life on the raft by the pond.

The pond, edged with reeds, shone the clouds back at themselves, and at us. I love that momentary disorientation of the world reflected in water one looks down at—for a few moments “as above so below” becomes a literal statement.

We ended our walk following a path uphill into the woods from the edge of one of the fields—a path I was pleased to discover did join the one Peter and I walked in August. In fact, it was the path where I took the photo of the wooden fence posts. It led us back to the driveway and then the car park by the barn. I am not known for my sense of direction or orienteering skills, but I begin to have a sense of the shape of the Reserve. Or some part of it.

Once again I didn’t take field notes… but I did write the bones of this post when I got home.