We drove home from Tennessee a day early, not realizing that while we were cruising up I81 in the brilliant sunshine the storm we were expecting to bring ice and snow had stalled over the Midwest.
Given a reprieve, we spent part of Saturday morning tooling around Northeastern Pennsylvania and the lake Wallenpaupack area where G worked at a camp owned by the Brooklyn YMCA on one of the smaller neighboring lakes. He couldn’t remember if the lake was near Hawley or Tafton so we just explored the lovely area. The camp is apparently long gone, and we had trouble finding anyone who remembered a camp which apparently closed more than 50 years ago, but it was nice just to putter about the countryside.
We used to spend time just wandering and puttering, stopping here and there and seeing whatever we found. But the 21st century obsession with not wasting time caught up with us and lately it seems we rush here and there, always trying to do more, with fewer stops just to sit and let the world wander by. We need to try slow down, appreciate the time to sit and relax, and let the world move a little more slowly.
I will leave you with this, a street sign found about a mile from where the one-time-campsite was located (now a nice housing development). It bears no relation to G’s youth, but the name on the street sign was G’s father’s name, although there are probably lots of Herman Steiners in the world. We just found it interesting in the self-absorbed way that we humans are always looking at ways to tie what we see into our own personal lives and stories, no matter how distant they may be.
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One response to “Happy New Year”
Perhaps George would like one of those street signs you can buy and put up, but with his name, or some permutation thereof? They’re very popular for farms and acreages around here.