two virginias

friday evening i decided at the last minute that tashi and i would join dan in his visit to a friend's cabin in the mountains of west virginia. the three of us had gone to the greek festival to have some good old dinner from the homeland, and dan was going to embark on the two hour drive afterwards. i wasn't sure if it would be worth it for us to join him, since we needed to return by 4 the next day so tash could attend a birthday party. i asked tashi what she wanted to do and she thought quite seriously about it over dinner, and then decided that we should join dan in his adventure. so we gathered up some things from home, piled into the trooper, and drove off with dan in the dark toward mathias, west virginia, where peter, sprout and lily would be waiting for us in their mountainside cabin near the lost river state park.

and what a cabin it was. a beautiful wooden two story high up in the trees. the windows looked out upon a deep and twinkling valley, and a long chain of the appalachians. a stood there mesmerized by stars and mist at 3am, after strong beer and heh heh heh, a wee bit of scotch and warmth from a wood burning stove. the trees were leafless still gestures in charcoal bathed in the bright light of a chipped moon.

we arose this morning to sunlight and sky, pancakes and eggs and bacon and bagles, and took a steep hike upward, upon the greenest, mossiest, spongiest forest floor i've ever tread upon. tashi was a great hiker, but pooped out when we neared the top, so her and i and sprout hung out by an outcropping of rocks. i built tashi a little lean-to out of long branches, and she crouched there pretending to cook acorn soup, while sprout and i discussed childbirth. lily and dan and peter danced about on "cranny crow", and afterwards shared with us their pictures of the vista.

we left after lunch, a visit too short, but just perfect. tashi made it to her birthday party, and now we are all sleepy and pleased because the country roads took us home to a place where we belong.