After the recent snow storms the following couple of weeks, like in the past, after a major snow storm, the weather turned cold, now, ah, that’s understating where the temperature went. Over the next two weeks on some days the high was in the teens. On other days it was a warm high in the upper twenties. This went on for, like I said, a couple of weeks. The calendar turns from February to the bi-polar month of March. You know what I’m talking about. Several days into March, and the weather has turned mild, the snow is melting, and visions of Spring are popping into your head. Spring is early, and wonderful. After a few days, even in this global warming world, you expect the warmth of 40 odd degrees to suddenly drop back to the 20s, and 30s. March is in a loving mood, so she kicks it up a notch,and suddenly over a weekend your looking at some really wonderful weather. Nastia asks me, after we've had lunch if I want to go for a walk around Conger’s lake.I’m tired, I’m now old, if you look at my new license photo, but the belt is tight, I’ve gained 12 lbs since November, and I can't wear sweaters in July, so I tell her let’s go.
Me at 68, and 21. I park the car at Rick’s Club, we run across the street and go to our left,talking as we walk around the park. It’s a brisk 2.1 or 2.3 mile trek around the park. The weather is warm, with a slight chill from the ice that still lies thick on its surface. We walk around the small pools on the path, and take big steps over shallow streams running from piles of snow across the black cracked tar towards the lake. We talk about nothing, and everything. Out of the forest into the parking lot past the swing sets where I taught them to jump off the swings while the swings were at their highest point. The path continues south around the lake to the dam on Gilcrest Road. At the dam, the town has placed a sign saying the path is closed. Like any good New Yorker, we ignore the sign figuring we can just turn back if there is a place we can’t cross. Three quarters of the way around a second sign appears. Mind you since we passed the first sign people have been coming from the other direction. No one seemed to be disturbed they had to turn back. We pass downed trees that fell during some of the recent storms crashing into and flattening the silver fence that blocks the park from the railroad tracks.In 20/20 hindsite, I did see a runner pass us, and unnoticed to me, I think he came back in the opposite direction I only vaguely remember him going by. This second sign blocks the path, and it is roped off with caution or police tape. We walk up to the sign, and look beyond it, the path curving out of site. I get the brilliant idea we can hop off the path, and walk the tracks back to the car, saving us walking the most likely mile, and a half back to the car.
The first spot I look at, the drop from the path is minor, but the ground is wet. I don’t want to walk the last of our walk in wet sneakers. The next spot, the ground is dry, but the drop is deeper. Nastia is all for the detour. She is all gung ho swinging her legs over the fence rail, Somewhere between leading the charge and being the first to drop over the rail, she pulls a I’ll go first, after you. I swing my legs over the rail, find an edge to jam my toes into. Once I’m setI jump down holding onto the rail. I’m surprised at several things. First, it further down than it looked, second I didn’t fall, and third, I was able to swing my legs over the rail, and not make a fool of myself. Nastia is ready,but she gets a case of the yipps. I slide my arm around her waist, and she sits on my upper arm, and is gently placed on the ground.The next fun thing is climbing the tree that crashed on the fence. I walk up the trunk, surprising myself, again, I’m not fallingoffit and breaking my neck. As a kid I did this all the time.Unfortunately I’m not that kid anymore, even though I try to be. Nastia, the girl who in the past complained there were no trees to climb, struggles, and continually is scared I’ll break my neck. We reach the tracks,and start to walk toward the road. I tell her how when I was a kid, I’d walk the tracks, and this one time a train came by. My friend and I thought we’d be sucked in because of how fast the train was going, so we hung on for dear life. After a moment or two I notice no pressure, and stand up. After the train passes, he looks at me, feels a bit foolish, and says, why didn’t you tell me! Nastia walks the tracks, I walk on the side telling her the ties are spaced irregularly, and to make it difficult to walk. The ties are sunk in the rock base, so it really isn’t true. I occasionally look over my shoulder for a train thinking about that scene in ‘Stand by me’ where they are crossing the rail bridge, and a train comes. Yes, I’m being overly dramatic,but that’s what happens when you get older, and nothing is black, and white any more. A train does come down the track,and yes we are not sucked into it. Nastia moves off the track, and we continue down the tracks. The train going in the opposite direction, a mere few feet away. The fifteen year old Joe would not worry about the smell of the diesel in the air,or the slight possibility the train could derail and flatten us without a warning.The 68 year old Joe does. The train passes,we survive with minimal damage to our lungs. Nastia talks to her sister, while we walk telling her the adventure we're on, and how she thought rightfully we'd get upset if they were walking the tracks. We reach Lake road, and civilization, turning right towards Rick's Club.
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