Walk Time

Duck and Young Diver

Emily went back last night. Two weeks went by so quickly!

While she was here, we baked lemon cake & several batches of cookies, made I-don't-know-how-many pancakes, microwaved over half a dozen instant pasta dishes. And we took a few morning walks together, sighting carp swimming against the current, feeding wild ducks on the lake of the park nearby, even giving morning greeting to turtles that mosied over to the edge of the water (pic on Sept. 11 post, "Tomoko Turtle").

At the end of one walk, she treated me to breakfast at Denny's. She works part-time at the Denny's near the place she lives while going to college, and part of her job includes learning the restaurant's menu. Denny's is starting a new menu, and she wanted to get a head start on learning it instead of waiting until after she got back. She hurriedly jotted down a few notes too of things the waitress said she wanted to incorporate herself.

Where'd He Go?!

Of course, the best part of the visit was just being able to chat...Emily and I can go for hours (no exaggeration here) talking about nothing really significant. Work at Denny's, school, friends, less about family, even less about current events...

No doubt the "best part" about being close to God is not so much what we do for Him or what He does for us...it's just being able to "chat" with Him.

The following was composed over twenty years ago:

Yesterday, I took a walk--
A good walk, a long walk, with a close friend.
How sweet the time was!
Today, A Friend asked to walk with me--
A Good Friend, a Close Friend.
Oh, can it be that He...wants to spend time with me?

It's actually the first poem I composed in Japanese first then translated into English. It was written for that close friend whom I took the walk with...a Japanese friend who does not read English. But I don't remember the Japanese; if I ever see that friend again or get a hold of the poem, I'll let you know!