Life After Peace Corps

Best Time of the Week

Sunday morning is the time I treasure the most.  Usually, I get up very early, clean my apartment, do laundry, and water my plants.  I walk around bared foot on the squeaky clean wooden floor, have a cup of 3 in 1 Chinese coffee and watch the sun comes up behind the two big sugar maple trees in front of my living room window.  That is how my day begins.

My apartment is facing east, captures all the morning sun.  As soon as the sun comes out, my plants become alive, someday, I could nearly hear them sing.  The blue morning glory plant whose seeds I brought back from Azerbaijan last year is growing nicely.  Actually, it is growing very aggressively. Its vines quickly spread by way of long, creeping sterns.   It seizes every object it can take hold of and grips on tight.  I have to trim the vines and let them grow along my floor lamp.  Soon I will see its blue flower.

After I make myself a hearty healthy breakfast, then I am ready to head out for a long walk.   My favorite part of the walk is a river gorge about five miles from where I live.  Some time I like to refer it as “my canyon” for I love the sound of it.   Inside the canyon, everything is just lovely.   Here is what I wrote when I first discovered this place:

I followed the watercourse and it led me to a narrow gulch.  Inside, the air was moist and cool.  Immediately, I was taken in by the luxuriance of plant life along the stream bank.  The vegetation was lush and green.  Soon I could hear the gurgling sound of running water echoing through the gully. Occasionally, small rapid appeared, and the water cascaded down to a rock chute.  There it was! a lovely water hole right underneath it.   Sun rays peeked through tree branches and casted a brilliant glow on the water surface.  At the bottom, pebbles covered with green algae and I found a few tiny fishes wiggling merrily.   Judging by the gully’s steep walls and richly forest, I was convinced that once upon a time, this place must be a remote coulee profuse with wildlife and exotic plants.  So I named this place “My Canyon”. 

This place is part of “My 26-mile hike training trail in Virginia” article.  I am still in a process of finishing it and hope to share it with my hiking friends in NY soon.  So stay tuned, my fellow 26-mile hikers.