That’s when I learned we were in this for the long haul: no money had as yet been allocated...or even sought for the project.
It hasn’t all been bad.
The traffic which has always been minimal by nearly any standard has now dwindled to a handful of vehicles daily. My habit of meandering all over the road hunting the best angle for photos may be dangerous if/when cars once again pass our way.
This summer, the empty road nestled in an area devoid of light pollution was the perfect spot for star gazing. With the warm pavement beneath my back, I spent long moments lying on the road discovering planets lined up along the edge of the mountains...Mars, Jupiter, Venus, or figuring out the location constellations with the help of my SkyView app.
Breathtaking splendor. Life giving pause.
What has always been a quiet place has been transformed to tranquility.
Life is like that. People make choices that we may not like or agree with, but we aren’t asked for our input. Bridges that seemed safe are deemed unpassable. Cracks appear in foundations that were once rock solid.
Stuff happens.
It feels unfair, inconvenient, maybe even terrible.
Certainly, life changing.
But maybe, in the process of dealing with the stuff, we find the scenic route, we see what we had never noticed before, we discover friendships we might have always driven right by.
We are surprised to hear ourselves feeling grateful for that closed bridge, and we know that in all the ways that are most important, we don’t want to go back.
We embrace the detour.
We choose the scenic route.
We watch for the wonder.