Where's Your Heaven ?

I received an email from a dear friend a few days ago. As I recall, it was a general note including a number of fellow writers. In it my old friend briefly described where he was, in the far NorthEastern U.S and parts of Canada, which have always been heaven to him.  How nice, I thought, to know exactly where heaven is. A longitude and latitude are comforting. This writer is no simple thinker; science and philosophy are his friends. He knows that heaven is not to be taken lightly.

I remember my mother telling me where heaven was to her, without exactly calling it that.  It began at that point on a long train trip from the mountains and deserts of the west, when the train windows began to reveal thick, lush woods, fields, little country streams, and tall, cool grass of the Mid-west. It was that point at which she said to herself, "I could walk home from here." That's it: the turning point for our heart's home.

I walked into my portent of heaven the other day, with two giddy leashed dogs, dancing with the excitement of their prospective walk and the chance to go leash-free and fly back into our arms when called.  On a warm, blue sky morning, we drove just a few miles to a place called Price Park.  Only about one hundred and twenty-five acres, very lightly trafficked  and home to birds and butterflies and no doubt many feathered, furred and scaley creatures. It begins just off a busy road, with an asphalt turnoff and lot this day unoccupied by other cars.

A wide swath had been mowed , creating several adjoining pastures, making the most distance of a fairly small area. The paths are bordered this time of year with meadows full of purple, yellow and white flowering weeds (?)  taller than our heads.  At the far edge, all around, there are tall oaks, some with benches beneath.

Walk far enough and you will come across a small incline down to a creek, bubbling over sharp  granite outcroppings and polished pebbles, home to glittering fish swimming among the stretches of mica-laced sand. There is even a narrow sandy beach where dogs and children can dabble.

Back on the trail, a field of what I think is yarrow and maybe wild mustard is filled with bumble bees, so fat they make the stems bend when they alight on their blooming tops.  The sound of ciccadas and crickets competes with the bees' buzzing and the bird calls from the oaks and fruit trees.

I never thought, when I left my beautiful Mid-west, that my portal to heaven would be in the deep South, although I know well that the South is the very definition of heaven to many. But there it was, a little stretch of land near a busy road, preserved in it's pristine form, close enough to visit on an early fall morning with two eager dogs.

And to make it even more certain that it is in the territory of heaven, there is a biscuit shack on the way home where we sat on porch rockers and  had wonderful, just-made, flakey biscuits and coffee. Well, no coffee for the dogs. Just bowls of cold water and warm biscuits. Heaven for them, too.