Outside the back door of the house where I grew up was a narrow path. It was a quaint footpath with spots of grass that were missing from years of use. The bare feet of my sister and I running and chasing one another, my mom walking to and from the clothesline to air dry our laundry, and my dad walking to and from his car to go to work every day were the cause of the missing spots of grass. When I followed this path for about a quarter of a mile, it led to an old, clay, dirt road where I would eventually end up on Garden Lane. This area was not a highly traveled area. Actually, there was hardly any traffic at all. A few neighbors used it as a back road to cut through to the main highway, but other than that, Garden Lane was simplistic and minimally maintained by the county. No flash or flare, it provided just enough space for a single car to travel. When a car did pass by, it’d take minutes for the dust to settle back down into the earth. It was almost as if the cars that did come down the road were unwelcome, in a way, and the dust that settled in the car’s wake reminded the road of its intruder.
Running alongside the dirt road was a ditch that lined either side. When I was little, this was a treasured spot I loved to frequent. It may seem highly unusual that one of my favorite places to visit as a seven-year-old girl was an old ditch that bred mosquitoes with black and white striped legs, but it was somewhere that I could experience freedom and go on adventures of my own.
While the adventures that awaited me were the reason I visited the ditch, the aspects of serenity and peacefulness by seeking refuge in nature were all too appealing for me to resist. On a hot summer day, or sometimes on a weekend in the early fall, which was never really fall at all in coastal Georgia, I would travel down this dirt road just so I could experience freedom and solitude. No parents, no teachers, or even friends for that matter. No rules or regulations. This allure is what drew me to the ditch time and time again.
Walking to the ditch as the scalding sun penetrated through my cotton tank top, I often reflected on how hot it was, but I didn’t care because I was alone. I enjoyed the five-minute walk from my house to the ditch as much as I enjoyed the ditch itself. The regal pines would provide much appreciated shade on a hot day, sacrificing themselves to the sun in order to protect the life that existed below its needles and limbs. Mother Nature in all her glory, outstretching her arms to provide a safe haven for the creatures who needed it most. The smell of the pines was so pungent and distinct that it would linger with me for hours, even after I returned home. Sometimes the wind picked up the scents of pine and carried them away like a soft melody. The perfect combination of shade and fresh air; this was my immediate reward for enduring such an intense journey.
The ditch was shaded, for the most part, and it ran the full length of Garden Lane. It was steep and usually filled with brackish water due to the summertime thunderstorms we experienced almost every evening. The edges were also covered with brown stickers and underbrush, daring to torture anyone who may enter, like a warning sign to a haunted house, “Beware” or “Enter at your own risk.” Despite the warnings from the local flora, this ditch was where I spent plenty of afternoons.
When I arrived at my hiding place, I would get down into the ditch and allow my eyes to peer over the embankment. My small hands would then clasp the top of the red earth as my feet burrowed into the side in order to strive to stay atop the murky water. Sometimes, when feeling an extraordinary sense of exploration, I would loosen my shoestrings, strip my feet of my red, Georgia clay-stained socks, thanks to a season spent on the softball fields, and allow my toes to burrow in the bottom of the soft, brown earth that lies underneath the ditch’s almost opaque waters. During these times when I did take my shoes off, it almost seemed as if my feet and the earth were engaging in a special kind of matrimony; intertwining with one another, discovering and learning everything about what makes the other whole.
Some days there would be tadpoles in the ditch, and they would swim furiously about with no schema at all. While I tried to identify with them, all I came away with were feelings of resentment and jealousy. Their sole existence was to experience nothing other than absolute freedom. They swam around without any restraint or any kind of governance to hold them back. However, I quickly forgave them when I realized that the tadpoles were confined to this ditch much like I was confined to my house. The juxtaposition between child and amphibian, each waiting to break free of their temporary homes, but only allowed to do so after its metamorphosis is complete.
When the tadpoles finally took notice of my feet in their waters, they gazed at this new, movable figure in their home. Some would even show their bravery by coming closer. They would do this until I flinched because of the tickling sensation my ankles were feeling from their even braver counterparts that chose to examine me further by seeing if I would make a new home for them or figuring out if I could potentially be their dinner.
When I bored of the tadpoles, I cast my attention towards the crawdads that also resided in the ecosystem of the ditch. They tunneled their way into the thick, muddy substrate and searched around trying to either find food, a home, or both. It intrigued me as I watched them because they seemed so simplistic, yet their sole purpose in life is survival, which is not so simplistic to them. They fumbled around with no rhyme or reason, yet they knew exactly what to do to survive. The crawdads were the most menacing thing to watch in this ditch of mine, so I continued to observe even more intently as they slowly moved about.
Sometimes I’d muster up my own bravery from somewhere deep inside and make myself pick up a crawdad. My intrigue of them overrode my fear. Nevertheless, I was still frightened by the claws of this creature. I clutched its slippery, black abdomen and hesitated, but carefully grabbed it, with my forefinger and thumb, quickly examined it, and then dropped it after about a minute due to fear for my petite fingers. Its pincers would show no mercy to human flesh, and while I meant them no harm, they could not tell. I would eventually let them go, and they would use their lobster-like claws to edge themselves back into the water. I only liked catching them for the thrill of it and examining them like some amateur scientist. Making mental notes about how slowly they moved and how they writhed around in my fingers trying to escape, I felt as if I were right in the middle of being the narrator of a Discovery Channel documentary, or even better, a less-intensified, female version of Steve Erwin “Crawdad Hunter,” may he rest.
When I decided not to amuse myself in the water, sometimes all I did was sit on a dry spot on the bank and throw small, smooth rocks or dried lumps of clay into the standing water. I likened the sense of peacefulness I felt when observing my ditch, much like a watchmaker spinning the gears of the hands of time to see what happened next. While sitting on the bank, I often tried to be as inconspicuous as possible to the few, surrounding neighbors who happened to be in their yards burning leaves, pine straw, and branches. Knowing that they saw me, I still pretended to remain innocuous. The train of gray smoke rising high from the incendiary piles of debris in their yards would often destroy the delicate scent the pines provided that I enjoyed so much. The smoke typically weaved and meandered until it found its resting place underneath my nose. It never failed to find me.
Towards the end of my journey, if not before, I would scan the area of the ditch where the blackberries tended to grow. If it was the wrong time of year, I would be highly disappointed, because the only evidence of blackberries would be dried leaves and shriveled vines from where these blackberries used to sprout. However, if it was the right time of year I would be overjoyed and enthused to find these charming berries, plentiful enough for me to feast on for the afternoon. Picking them straight from the vines, I would shove them in my mouth and enjoy the sweet and sour juices they produced. Without hesitation, and without thinking twice that my mother would disapprove of me eating a foreign berry without properly identifying it, it would become a secret just between the ditch and myself. The innocence of a secret borne by nature and bounded by a promise. Only the ditch saw this exchange but agreed not to tell.
Walking back home barefoot as the pine straw itched the bottom of my feet, I watched the yellow and orange sunset glisten through the tops of the pine trees. Sometimes the sound of the rustling leaves that had fallen early, grazed effortlessly across the ground. It was the most beautiful sound of all because it meant fall was coming. The heat would soon subside, the tadpoles would grow into young frogs, the crawdads would begin to burrow in preparation of the cold weather, and the blackberries would yield produce no more. When I turned off of Garden Lane and back onto the footpath that led back to my house, I realized that the ditch was always there when I needed it and would always be just as reliable. It was only during certain times of the year that I would visit this unlikely place, but when I did, I always felt refreshed and at ease with myself, partly because I was alone and partly due to the fact that I did have freedom, much like the tadpoles, even if it was only an afternoon.
Devon's Writing Corner 