I went outside to film my weekly video for 5 Girls 5 Minutes, the video collaboration that I share with my friends. The day was beautiful, if a bit hot, and the leaves crinkled around me as I walked to the little wooded area behind my condo complex. Today is Rhett McLaughlin‘s birthday, so I wanted to do something special. I don’t go into those woods as much as I should. I’d like to now.
A pair of wooden chairs were sitting beside each other in a small clearing. I sat in one and filmed. Then I sat in it and thought, looking around at all of the thankfully untouched nature that was right there and waiting. Unfortunately, there are cans and bottles near the edges, from lazy people who wouldn’t know what a recycling container looked like if it snuck up on them and punched them in the face.
NaNoWriMo season is starting up again. I think I may go back to this place and this chair. I think I will clean up the cans. And I think I will write there.
It’s what Thoreau would do. And, more importantly, it’s what ten-year-old me would do. Wooded areas were my stomping ground, growing up; where I’d create stories and scenes and moments. My imagination went wild when surrounded by leaves and the soft twitter of birds, and trees too thick to hug but huggable anyway. This place is like a preserved memory. I think I belong there.
