NON-FICTION: Panorama

pan·o·ram·a [pan-uh-ram-uh, -rah-muh] –noun
1.an unobstructed and wide view of an extensive area in all directions.
2. a continuously passing or changing scene or an unfolding of events.

Ziggy hasn’t gotten over yanking on the leash, so I’m anxious to pass the ballplayers, reach the trail by the river to let him off.

An unseasonably cold Holy Saturday in April, intent on a good dog run and scamper, I deliberate on our route. Up a little to the right, a long flat path doubles back easily above the ball field for my shorter days.

I haven’t been to the top of West Rock since winter’s days of comfort raised it up, since my legs grew accustomed to rest. If I wasn’t alone I would do it. I would be the one coaxing my friend Maryann along, or Maureen, reluctant, complaining that she doesn’t like hiking, though as a child, she was our little mountain goat, bounding up Blue Mountain’s high peak while I halted, caught my breath, tried to keep up.

What if this was my last time, if after today I wasn’t able anymore?

To the log, I push, I’ll try the log, see how I feel. If I wasn’t alone I’d do it, caught in conversation lifting me easily along, and so I think of all the peaks achieved, how West Rock Mountain is relatively small.

I remember Dad swinging his arms as we walked part way down Watkin’s Glen, head turning from side to side. The perfect exercise he said—this former soldier and high school football, basketball, baseball and tennis star would know, even though I never once saw him wear sneakers.

We stopped at the overlook, the panorama he’d say. Better than that other four-syllable word he loved, ignoramus, teaching us instead the longest palindrome in the world—A man, a plan, a canal…Panama. We’d be tired, but he’d push on. And I see how it was both for us and through us that he would lead, as my children give me the strength and will to do what I otherwise might skip without them-as-point. What’s the point? Maureen and Drew.

At Camp Uncas, I canoed Maureen over to the peninsula where bears have been spotted, 10 miles into heart of wilderness, unafraid with her, but afraid to do it alone.

Strength by five-year old in tow. Strength with five-year old in tow. The mystery of parenting, how it makes us stronger. Puts a point on everything. Imparts wisdom to ignoramuses—of panoramic palindromes and the wonders of the natural world. Parented, parenting, caring for a pet.

I start to focus on the two feet of ground in front of me, peripheral vision as the trail turns rocky and steepness increases with my heart rate, slapping on the leash just before the summit, the asphalt road hardly anyone travels from the other side of the mountain.

What if this were the last time?

How does winter manage to raise the mountain every year, a few yards higher than I remember from beneath my sister Laurie’s afghan in my recliner?

I walk off the slight burn in newly discovered inner thighs, ambling towards Judge’s Cave where half a dozen cyclists rest in self-satisfaction knowingly shared. It’s been a while since I had a good and tired dog, since I tamped that mountain down into a manageable piece of weekly routine. In the heart of summer it’s nearly daily, shrunk to a reasonable size, no big whoop.

Here, on what is perhaps the last day I am able to, Ziggy and I circle the summit, then turn off the asphalt for the big descent. Just past the dangerous drop, I raise my hand in the signal for “sit,” which by some miracle of training he does. Slip off the leash. He darts ahead and down, as is his nature.