Back road interlude

Spring break means distance, not of traveling thousands of miles, but distance from "to do" lists, from self.

I took a short drive today, into eastern Oklahoma County, past new and old houses,through woods and pastures, over creeks and rivers, on back roads and not Interstates. Radio off. Bird sound when you pull up to a stop sign every mile. Soaring hawks, greening wheat. Room and time for imagination and thoughts and photos about how quickly life changes just a few minutes away from traffic. Don't ask what I do on spring break. I just am.

On a gate post to a house in a wooded area.

Barn door

North Canadian River, downstream from OKC, looking south,  at Hefner Road

Looking northeast

Where it loops back east and south, at Hiwassee Road

I love wheat in the spring, bringing bright color to our landscapes, the promise of life to come.

You can feel the distance.

Deep Fork Creek, east of Arcadia, into which Coffee Creek-pictured in my blog title above-- flows.

Man has been here a long time.

The historic round barn at Arcadia, 10 miles east and a century from Edmond, on old U.S. 66. Back to traffic. I grew up within a few miles of  US 66 in Albuquerque, and have spent a lot of my later life within a few blocks of it in Oklahoma City and Edmond. We now live less than a a mile south of its old route through Edmond.

Another reminder of slower traffic and life, visible from old US 66, a few miles east of our house.

 That's why it's good to slow down, think, and take a break from today.