The sun had just set but the moon had already been up for hours. It sat high in the sky. Almost full, but not quite. She didn't notice this nearly full moon above her but saw it shimmering on the river. The evening river was very calm with a few ripples that made the moon's reflection dance and catch her eye through the leafless branches on the river bank. It was still such a clear sky. One week into November, a month that is normally the gloomiest, cloudiest, wettest, saddest month and here once again the sky was cloudless, the air was crisp and dry and even the color on the leaves made the mood warm and cheerful. Tonight she made sure to take the extra time to walk the dogs a little longer than normal. They had already walked nearly an hour this morning but with the weather so nice she wanted to take advantage of every moment she could while the fall weather still remained.
She noticed the color this year the most. The reds and the burnt oranges and the browns and greens. She came across a bush tonight with faded green leaves that were golden brown on the tips. It was absolutely lovely. How could she have not noticed these glorious colors in years past? Was this year that much more spectacular? It seems that without the normal fall rainfall that there would be no color this year. She wishes now that she wouldn't have blown off that 9th grade biology assignment where they had to collect and identify 50 different leaves. It would be nice to know the names of all these various trees and bushes with the wild colors they have produced. They deserved to be known by name for the beauty they brought to her life.
Her mind filled with thoughts and ideas. How can people run and walk with earphones stuck in their ears she thought? This is my time to let my mind wander, to enjoy my surroundings and let the thoughts take hold to form into ideas. It was her time to work through various problems she encountered. If she didn't have this time she was sure that she wouldn't be able to get to sleep. She had a hard time turning off her brain sometimes. She couldn't always let go of the little things. Even things that she no longer had the responsibility for – her brain still worked on finding better ways to solve the problem.
But here today, on this walk with her dogs, she found she could turn off some of that outside noise in her brain by focusing on her walk. She straightened her back – walked a little taller. Then she tried lengthening her stride. Her shoe rubbed on her heal. Why do all her tennis shoes wear out on her heal she wondered? She tried to push her toes up into the shoe to make the rubbing on her heal lessen. It worked for a few steps but then the fabric that had worn through on the inside of her shoe started to irritate her heal once again. 10 more blocks. 8 more blocks. 5 more blocks. She vowed to throw these shoes away once she got home.