Spring Renewal

This blog has become my travelogue!

Flora and I spent the weekend camping at Lake Somerville State Park. I'd never been or ever heard of it, and those are 2 of my favorite criteria for going somewhere these days. Flora also has a love of the new. And butterflies. and ladybugs.

This was our Spring Renewal, an idea she came up with a few months ago. We've decided that every spring, we'll go somewhere to have a little ceremony, just the two of us. We each pick a song to play to each other. We say a few words about what each of us likes about ourselves in this relationship, about the other person, and both of us together. Then we say a few words about what we'd like to work on individually, what we'd like to see the other person work on, and what we'd like to work on together. Then we ask each other if we'd like to go for another year, through the good times and the hard times. We feed each other something bitter to remember to love each other even when it's not easy, and we feed each other something sweet, to remember to enjoy the good times to the utmost.

We both said yes, if you were wondering.

It was a fun little ceremony, full of smiles and laughter and kisses. I fed her bitter melon and dragon fruit, because I've never tried either. I think I've probably mentioned that we're all about trying new things these days. She fed me ajwain, because it's part of a mix of seeds, along with fennel, that she often eats after meals to help with digestion, and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups Minis, because she knows I have a thing for chocolate. She also made some kind of innuendo over the peanut butter cups, but I can't for the life of me remember what it was now.

So we had a transcendent time. I can honestly say I enjoyed every single minute of it, including both the drive there and the drive back. She is marvelous company. She embodies the essence of fighting back against something I heard discussed on the episode "What Was Not Said" on NPR's Invisibilia. They talked about studies of people in relationships where each person is asked to predict their partner's response to questions. What they found is that most of us are both supremely confident that we can predict our partner's answers and also barely better than chance at predicting correctly. We think we know our partners, but we don't. Not really. They say this is may be because we come to a point in our relationships where we think we know the other person so well that we stop asking what they like, what they think, what they feel, what they want. Why ask if you already know? And so we know less and less about each other over time.

With Flora, there are always questions. Deep and shallow. Funny and serious. We talk and talk and talk and never seem to run out of things to say. She asks, and I answer. I ask, and she answers. Long conversations are sparked. Our words meander all over our lives. She does ask more than I though. She's better at it. I have to work to keep up.

So we talked while we drove. We stopped at a couple of historical markers. I was beginning to think there were no good stories left to be found, only tales of rich people building their fortunes and donating land to their communities. But this time we found #7562, about the Chisholm Trail in Burleson County:

"The Chisholm Trail, which was developed following the Civil War, allowed Texas cattle to be driven to railheads in Kansas for shipment to eastern markets. An arm of the celebrated route, reaching from Matagorda County to the main trail near present McGregor, passed through this area. With the establishment of James L. Dean's store, later the site of Deanville, and the White Inn, the trail became a significant commercial road. Vital to the development of Burleson County's cattle industry, it declined in use after rail lines reached the area in the late 1870s."

It's over 50 miles from the little piece of the Chisholm Trail I'm familiar with, the round rock which was a marker on the trail in the middle of Brushy Creek in the city of, coincidentally, Round Rock. The distance between these pieces of the trail, and the unexpectedness of finding the reference, and the marker's mention of railheads in Kansas made me reflect for a moment on the huge undertaking it would be to drive one's cattle across such long distances in order to sell them, and I was struck by the intrepid perseverance of man. But I was a little disappointed there wasn't more blood and gore in the tale told by this particular marker.

Luckily, the next marker, #9209, stepped up its game to give the people what they want. It starts slowly, leading one to believe it's another snoozer about land acquisition: "Laid out 1871; named for Jas. McDade, Brenham lawyer. Became a thriving town, important freight center and early-day stage stop. School-church was built 1872." It takes a sudden left turn into my kind of historical marker tale, one with blood and violence: "Vigilantes (organized 1883) lynched three men on Christmas Eve, causing a shoot-out next day at the Rock Saloon (now a museum)."

My only regret of the weekend is that we did not make time for a short stop at that museum.

There's more on the story at the Texas State Historical Association Online. It sounds like it would have made a great western, with a back and forth battle between outlaws and vigilantes in a lawless town until no one can really recognize what justice looks like anymore.

So yeah. So much fun! We talked and talked between historical markers. At the camp we sat all evening on the beach watching the lake and making up dialog for all the birds that flew, swam, and floated past. We hiked all day and talked, and looked at animal prints and bugs and flowers and trees. We watched a woodpecker work for a good little while. We stood at a respectful distance as a snake crossed the trail. We saw a bunny eating his breakfast and were somewhat less respectful to him than to the snake. We even wandered into a part of the forest dominated by an old, rotted tree surrounded on all sides by long, hanging strands of Spanish moss. It felt almost magical, as if we could push through the curtain of moss and wander straight into another realm of witches and fauns.

After the hike, I kayaked for a bit, because Flora is much too sensible to set her butt down in a wobbly craft in frigid water on a choppy lake. I paddled a goodly while and was gawked at by Boy Scouts, waved to by several people fishing, and was much too closely approached by an exuberant, stick-chasing dog, given the frigid and choppy nature of the water. I managed to stay upright and afloat, though. I paddled up an inlet that got more and more shallow; when I found myself closely watched by a trio of buzzards standing in a line on the shore, I decided it was time to go back lest they knew something I didn't. So I returned to Flora waiting for me on shore, and made as I approached a lewd joke about slipping my boat into her harbor.

So yes, we were renewed. Travel renews. Love renews, if you remember to renew it. Conversation renews. Words make the heart and mind and soul visible in ways they cannot otherwise be. So speak to each other, I advise, no matter how long you've been together. Ask each other questions to which you already know the answer and be surprised when the answer is something different after all. Be honest. Be open. Be fearless and kind. Give each other the bitter, and the sweet. Look for bloody tales on the side of the road. And never forget to make lewd jokes.