The Little Things

Sometimes it’s the sweeping view of the landscape and the sky that catches my attention. When I started off this morning after a healthy breakfast in the relatively cool part of the day, I thought the most interesting scene I might see were the sunbeams filtering down through the clouds. I ended up snapping quite a few photos of that view because….well, you never can tell what the day might bring, and I have to have something to write about when it’s all said and done.

Once again, the Universe proved me wrong. It was mid-afternoon, and any semblance of cool had long since been banished as the day had matured. I mean, it wasn’t quite like walking across the anvil of the sun, but it was pretty close.

The bright green grass that has been a companion over the last several weeks was starting to get the singed yellow edges that come with the dog days of summer. I was crunching along a gravel county road, and each step sent up a little plume of pulverized rock that immediately adhered to the perspiration on my lower legs. I was like a one man pedestrian cement factory chuffing along.

I glanced up to my left, and saw one of the few remaining stands of wildflowers. I thought I better take a few photos before the summer heat finishes its grim work and the flowers disappear until next spring. Actually, I just needed to rest a little and some flower photography seemed like a good excuse.

I’ve been trying to capture a picture of a butterfly going about the busy work of pollination for quite some time now. After many a frustrating attempt, I can tell you that they seem to have a sixth sense about photography. They’ll spread their colorful wings and pose right until the moment the camera comes out. Then they’re off like the ethereal insects they are.

Green Sweat Bee At Work - Webster County, Iowa

I was under no illusion this time about capturing a butterfly. I moved in close to some pretty purple flowers and started snapping away. Just as soon as I took the first photograph, a bee landed and started dancing around the flower collecting nectar. I just kept exercising the shutter.

Only later, when I reviewed the photographs, did I realized that I’d been lucky enough to capture a Green Sweat Bee at his work. Green Sweat Bees are solitary dwellers eschewing the comfort of the hive to live in burrows on their own. This one is definitely identifiable as a male owing to the distinct striping on his abdomen.

Sometimes it’s the little things that break through and capture my attention. Today was one of those times.

Crossing I-35

Junction of County Highway D35 and I-35 near Blairsburg, Iowa

Anyone living in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex probably has a great deal of familiarity with Interstate 35. I know that the highway and associated beltways were a fairly broadly discussed and experienced topic in my own youth growing up in the Dallas area.

I-35 is a major north-south interstate highway that runs from its southern terminus in Laredo, TX all the way up north, ending in Duluth, MN. It’s a little over fifteen hundred miles long making it the third longest north south interstate in the country behind I-75 and I-95. The last section of I-35 to be completed in the late 1970’s is the section through central Iowa

Today, near the town of Blairsville, Iowa, I crossed under the I-35 overpass. It was a bit of a milestone since that road that was carrying cars, trucks, and busses just a few meters over my head had such a big impact on my experience down in Dallas. We used to head north on I-35 to visit my grandparents in Oklahoma, and I can still remember the welcome center on the TX-OK border like it was yesterday. 

Today, the overpass provided some much needed shade.

Over the last one hundred days, or so, the time I’ve spent out on the road has reminded me how much these concrete rivers of commerce and communication shape our lives and our experiences. It’s almost unfathomable to me that I could have climbed up the grassy green embankment today and be connected with my hometown by an uninterrupted ribbon of concrete and asphalt.

Sure there’d be traffic, but a couple of days from now, I could be back in my Texas aving passed through the town in Oklahoma where I spent the summers with my grandparents. It’s an incredible legacy this road system that we’ve inherited bestows upon us. I’m grateful that we have it. Even with all the traffic, and the attendant frustrations associated with that bit of frustration.

Do any of you have stories about roadways that have shaped your life?