Moving Day

Jon Morgan begins his most excellent adventures as a Sophmore this week at UMASS, which means only one thing. Load up the car, load up the rat, load up the boy and drive off into the wide blue yonder (it was today, quite bright and blue but more on that later). We did that very thing and made our way to UMASS at Amherst by noon, and although it was busy, it was well managed by lots of bright chirpy RA types. Traffic flow was fine on campus, it would have been helpful to know BEFORE I went to the last entrance that it was a one way day, feedback for next year. We get to the dorm and I wait in the illegal parking space while Jon goes and checks in and of course, he lives on the 5th floor and there's such a line by the one elevator that we just cowboy up and start up the five flights with heavy bags of Jon gear. I am fitter than many fifty somethings, but not nearly as fit as the weight lifting 20 year old. So huffing and puffing I went and on the way down for Belongings V 2.0 we meet the roomate, an affable kid named Matthew who then proceeds to lug Jon's amp up the five flights of stairs while I sherpa the rock star gear and Jon carries the fridge. And back down and back up and so on and so on and then I take Jon to CVS because I've been learning too much about H1N1 flu for work and decide he needs MORE hand sanitizer and a variety of fever and pain reducing medicines. Of course if he gets sick, he'll just come home. Barely enough room at UMASS for healthy students, forget about sick ones. Finally, I'm satisfied that my fledgeling has all that he needs, and more importantly wants me GONE so I head for home.

Since it's such a beautiful day, cool and sunny and I have a two hour drive to recover from the five flights of stairs, Steve decides we should walk when I get home. (Could be worse, there are seven floors in Field - the dorm). Steve thinks a walk to the ATM and home would be fine, but NOOOOO we have 54 of the 60 hikes left, so I find one more, this one close to home on the Indian Ridge esker. Off we go with the dog and mange to get lost and read the directions wrong and backtrack and walk more than the promised three mile loop, but it didn't matter because it was a beautiful day and we had the woods to ourselves and tomorrow is the last quiet day before work goes into high gear for us both. This weekend feels like a fitting end to summer as all of New England readies itself for fall.

Hike-Ku for Indian Ridge

Five swans at dinner
geese honking, crickets chirping,
Summer's end in song.