Travel During a Time of Turmoil and Peak Leaf Season

I am writing in my little house in the mountains, in Arden, NC.  I am at the end of a reading week for seminary, a week where I also turned in grades for one of my online classes that I teach, while also finishing the course shell for an online class that starts Monday.  When I entered these dates into the calendar, I thought my spouse might come to me to spend a few days in our seminary apartment.

But I'm the one that likes to drive.  I'm the one who has been craving a trip to the mountains for an apple orchard or a winery or a hike.  So I offered to be the one to drive back for a long week-end together.

I had been looking forward to seeing the mountains that were supposed to be at full peak color.  As I set out, the rain started to fall.  Through much of my drive yesterday, the mountains were cloaked in mist, clouds, and full out rain.  Although I didn't see far-off vistas for much of my drive, the individual trees were gorgeous.  Or to be more accurate:  some of them were gorgeous, while some of them had lost all of their leaves, while others only had a burst of color amidst full-on green, and others were half in color and half twiggy branches where leaves had been recently.

Despite the rain/mist/fog, it was a fairly easy drive.  When I left my seminary apartment, I heard a BBC episode about how the war in Ukraine might end and the mindset of Putin.  Along the way, I heard from Iranian activists who are hoping to secure more rights for women (and perhaps a regime change) and updates about vaccination rates and upcoming seasons of disease.  

I got back in the car at the end of the day to do a quick grocery store run, and I was just in time for the roll call vote from the January 6 committee, as they voted to subpoena Donald John Trump.  It was an interesting book-end to the day that began with commentators thinking about the path to nuclear war over Ukraine.

But the leaves are glorious.  During the last part of my trip through the North Carolina mountains, I saw the blazing colors that I had been promised.  This morning, I wrote these lines, after reading this provocatively titled essay, "We Are On a Path to Nuclear War."

We wait on leaves to fall
Or maybe nuclear bombs to drop.

Then I added a line from my list of interesting lines that didn't see development in previous essays:

I travel with a bag; I may not make it home

Here's how it looks right now:

We wait on leaves to fall
Or maybe nuclear bombs to drop.
I travel with a bag; I may not make it home

I'll keep this document open on my computer.  Perhaps I will add to it as I work on seminary papers and presentations that are due next week.  Maybe I will just enjoy the leaves.