There’s a spring walk down the road ~ March 24, 1988

David Heiller

The sun rose above the clouds on Thursday morning, bringing warmth to the 20-degree March day. Ten inches of snow still lay on the fields from the March 12 storm. Mother Nature had temporarily delayed spring, but the sun rising above the eastern clouds had other notions.

“Let’s go for a walk,” I said to the kids.

“Yeah, let’s go for a walk, two-year-old Malika answered. She headed for the blue room to get her coat

“All right,” four-year-old Noah conceded: He snapped off Sesame Street, and followed Mollie to the blue room.

Noah and Malika, as different as they can be.

Mollie and Noah are brother and sister, they have been raised by the same set of parents in the same house, and the same way, but they are as different as the sun and the moon when it comes to a walk. Mollie runs to the door when we talk “walk. “ Noah usually gives in after a sales pitch.

Binti heard the clamor as we hit the porch, and sat twitching in front of the house. She can sense a walk from 20 yards, even when we are inside and she is outside. Now she could barely sit still, waiting for us, sitting and hopping all at the same time likes dogs will do.

Malika spotted Binti sitting, and headed for her.

Malika, at age two, felt as though
she should be able to supervise Binti. 
Binti didn't pay her much mind.

“Ι’ma ride Binti,” she claimed. “Hold still Binti.” She grabbed the 70-pound dog by the ear, and tried to lift a leg over.

Bind twitched off to one side.

Mollie lifted her leg again; grabbing Bind’s other ear as well.

Binti hopped to the rear. Mollie looked like Roy Rogers after some bad guy put a burr under Trigger’s saddle.

“Υοu can’t ride Binti,” I said. “She’s a dog, not a horse.”

“Oh all right,” Mollie answered, giving in like her big brother.

I grabbed the plastic sled, and Mollie climbed aboard, sitting on an old blanket. Noah walked ahead. He had been reluctant to come outside, but once outside, he caught the scent of spring, and headed down the driveway. Binti charged out of her blocks, sure now that the walk was for real, and disappeared into the ditch far ahead of us.

The gravel road was bare of snow in the middle, but the sled pulled easily-over gravel. At least it did until Noah climbed aboard behind Malika. Then I headed for the ditch. It was rough going, in snowplow droppings, so I slid the sled over the shoulder, and into the snowy ditch. The sled has a 10-foot long rope, so I pulled from the roadbed, while the kids slid along at an angle five feet below me.

Noah loved it. He laughed and leaned forward. Mollie, sitting ahead of him, did not agree. She started to whine, “Stop, Daddy.” I pulled them almost up onto the road, then let the sled go sliding backward, down onto an icy patch in the bottom of the ditch.

Malika complained again, but with Noah laughing from behind and me cheering from above, she was soon smiling too.

We reached two huge culverts which Pine County workers put on our road last summer. This was the halfway point of the walk. I sat down on the sled, while Noah scaled the bank onto the culvert. An icy patch, 20 feet long, stretched in front of the culvert. Soon he was sliding on it, laughing.

“Let me get down dare,” Mollie asked.

“You can go,” I said.

Noah walked over and reached up a hand from below, while I did the same from above. Soon she stood next to him on the ice. She immediately wanted to come back to me.

Noah hanging out at the tail end of winter.

Sitting on the blanket on the sled, soaking up a 30-degree March sun, I wasn’t about to move. I threw her the rope from the sled. She grabbed the end, and pulled herself up the culvert mountain. Then she used the rope to descend, and climbed up again. Then she let go of the rope and made the climb solo.

I pulled an orange from my coat pocket, and peeled it. The kids climbed up from the ditch. We sat on the sled, eating the orange. It tasted like spring, warm and juicy and sweet, with a promise for more.

The sun rose higher, moving the eastern clouds out all together. The hard-packed road showed signs of a few muddy spots. Time to get going. Noah led the way back north, toward home, while Malika rode again. Maybe that’s why Mollie likes walks, because she always rides on them.

The road stayed clear of cars as we made our way back home. Sometimes only a couple cars a day will pass our house, especially on a lazy Thursday morning. I glanced behind for a car, but knew none would come.

Cindy and I have taken walks on this road from the first day we moved here six years ago. It’s not breathtaking. Scrubby lowland to the west, an old hayfield to the right. A quarter mile on either side, the woods start. Binti chased a bear into the woods to the west on a walk our first summer here. Binti was smart enough not to follow it into the woods. We’ve walked the road with friends and relatives, with kids on our backs and kids inside Cindy’s belly. We’ve stuck walking sticks three feet down into frost boils in the spring. We’ve walked through a blizzard of snow in January, and a blizzard of fireflies in June. We’ve walked through fog in summer evenings. We’ve walked happily together, and we’ve walked angrily alone.

And we’ve walked through sunshine in the early days of spring, with kids on a Thursday morning. With a fresh orange, there’s nothing finer.