Efficiency vs. Beauty and Grace
Having left a car for my aunt to use
At the assisted living place where my Dad lives
While she visits him
I walk home, a distance of about half a mile
In the bright spring sunshine,
Wondering why I don’t walk more.
I see things I don’t see when I drive
But, darn it, I have places to go and
People to see and don’t have the time
To walk everywhere and so I don’t.
But I should.
I remember my grandmother talking about
Walking to see people a distance of eight miles
One way. That would take five hours total,
Visiting time not included.
Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy walked
Twenty miles in a day just for a lark
Or a daffodil or a beautiful spring lea.
I am such a weakling, insulated from nature
Most of the time, moving from heated space
To heated space or air conditioning to air conditioning.
I am missing out on so much Beauty and Grace
In the name of cold Efficiency.
Biscuit City 