Walking. In Search of my Spirit Bird.

4:25 am. I’m out the door. Dark Sky app recap: 74° F, 100% humidity, cloud cover 89%.

It’s dark. A wafer thin haze hangs below the street lamps.

I walk.

A firefly flickers, gets caught up in a light wind gust, and disappears. And at that moment, unexplainably so, I felt Small, Little, against the backdrop of the World. This flickering, illuminating, little miracle. “What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.” (Crowfoot, the Blackfoot warrior, 1890)

Me and Crowfoot?  Crowfoot and me? Crowfoot and I? Oh, for God Sake, let it go.

I walk.

Same route. 5-mile loop. Since May 5th, daily, without interruption. Same camera bag sling, slung over my right shoulder, camera affixed with strap to right wrist. The Autonoman. 

Raccoon up ahead, picking away at the remains of road kill. He skitters away as I approach. Sprinkler systems fire off at 4:30 am, hissing as water hits the street.

I walk.

I note the silence. This narrow slice of time, before daybreak. Nocturnal creatures and me. Afraid of horror movies, the dark and tripping in a pothole and taking a header, I march through the suburban streets on my way to the waterfront.

I take my first shots of The Cove, high tide.  And 78 additional shots that morning.  Little did I know, that 90 minutes later I would learn that all but 10 photos, would be blurry because of some dial I inadvertently depressed. Fuming, at my desk panning through the photos, rubbing my eyes, thinking it’s my f*cking eyes going, because it just can’t be this expensive camera. I move closer to the screen. It’s not my eyes.  My God. You are an Amateur. What a waste.

I walk.

I look for my Swans. I find them. Snow white feathers illuminating the dark, heads tucked under their wings. They sleep, floating peacefully. Wish I could do that.

Canada Geese, quiet. Several flocks. Some preening. Others feeding.

I look for my Cormorant(s). Can’t find her.  “What’s Your Spirit Bird?” My Spirit Bird? I found it. She’s it. Always working. Always eating. Frenetic. Never pausing to enjoy the scenery, or the moment.  Dives deep, holds her breath for extended periods of time. Comes up gasping for air, before diving back down again. Matte black finish, dark, dark, dark. Where the hell is the Light? Her feathers, not waterproof, allow her to sink and dive more efficiently. Down, Down, Down, Down, into the deep darkness. Me and my Cormorant. I can’t find her. She’s a no show.

Clouds heavy, so little Light today. Dreary day. No spectacular sun rise. Meetings, calls, Zooms fire up in 120 minutes. Heaviness piles on.

I’ve got 500 yards of water left before I’m back on asphalt and heading home. My eyes hungry for any bit of inspiration, and here they come. Mama and her brood, little ones scooching behind her. Heaviness lifts for a moment as I watch them swim away.

Rebecca Solnit wasn’t telling me anything that I hadn’t known.

“In the experience of walking, each step is a thought. You can’t escape yourself.”

Notes:

• Photo: Daybreak, in Formation. 5:28 am. July 10, 2020. 74° F. Humidity 100%. Wind: 5 mph. Gusts: 10 mph. Cloud Cover: 89%. Weed Avenue, Stamford, CT
• Inspired by: “Henry David Thoreau, who walked more vigorously than me on the other side of the continent, wrote of the local, “An absolutely new prospect is a great happiness, and I can still get this any afternoon. Two or three hours’ walking will carry me to as strange a country as I expect ever to see. A single farmhouse which I had not seen before is sometimes as good as the dominions of the King of Dahomey. There is in fact a sort of harmony discoverable between the capabilities of the landscape within a circle of ten miles’ radius, or the limits of an afternoon walk, and the threescore years and ten of human life. It will never become quite familiar to you.” ~ Rebecca Solnit, Wanderlust: A History of Walking (Penguin Books (June 1, 2001)