Seasons

The road doesn't stand out very much if you're not keeping your eye out for the old building that sits on the corner.  It's always been the landmark of the final leg of a very long journey, telling you you're almost there.  The road takes you quickly out of the town below, rising and twisting through so many different views in only minutes.  You still can't believe that you're not that far away from a bustling college town.

After a left at the church on the hill you turn onto a gravel drive hidden in the trees, the green moss creeping over the rocks a sign that you're in a completely different world.  As the car shuts off and you open your door, you're met by the wash of water through the creek.  The cool moist air wraps around your skin and that deep earthy smell finally reaches you.  Eyes close momentarily and you're still, and it's perfect.


My family has been visiting my Grandpa at his cabin in the Appalachians of North Carolina since I can remember.  It's been his summer home for thirty years.  When I was little I would take my barbies and let them have adventures in the creek that flows outside the back deck.  There has never been a trip, even into my twenties, that I haven't spent even a little time building a fairy village with tiny stone steps down to the water, or finding sticks just the right length to build a raft to float through the rapids.  Evenings were marked by a trip over the bridge and along the back road to the apple tree that supplied us with as many tart, little green apples as we wanted.

I was in high school when I finally knew that North Carolina was my future home.  I didn't know how I was going to get there, but I felt it in the vibrating of my soul, just at the thought.  Last weekend I took a trip up to the cabin with my mom, aunt, and cousin as a Father's Day surprise for Grandpa.  I hadn't been in two years, so it was pretty exciting.  We spent a lot of time with Grandpa and found some pretty good views.



Sophee, still aspiring to be a juvenile delinquent.



View of Boone from Howard's Knob

Pretty flowers from our walk!

To the apple tree...

This little guy landed on me while I was standing on the waterfall.

The rushing, raging creek.

On the parkway.

Right after I took this picture a man came walking down that hill, hopped the fence, got in his car, and drove away.

I always like to take pictures of wavy grass.

I managed to snap this in a moving vehicle the day we left.

But the trip wasn't just to see Grandpa.

Recently my Grandpa and his wife had been considering selling the cabin and staying in Florida year round.  I won't get into details, but keeping the cabin has become a burden on them, and this summer they got serious.  We went up there for a weekend to see if he needed help getting anything ready, and while we were there the signs went up.

Now, just days later, they've sold it.  It's finally real that I'll probably never have my morning tea on the back deck again, never haul a cold watermelon up the steps beside the waterfall, never squeeze into the older-than-me Suburban for a trek down the mountain.  The gateway through which I came to fall in love with the mountains has closed.  I must find some other route.

I've heard people talk about seasons in a comforting way, "There's a season for everything."  They talk about better things to come.  But what I don't hear very often is the opposite: when a brilliant and wonderful season must pass away, and you're left to face a new and unknown season.  I try to remind myself  that there's no guarantee that this is the end.  I don't really know for sure that I'll never see that place again.  What I do know is that God will get me back there somehow.  But the knowing doesn't make this new season hurt any less.