... down, down the rutted path along the overgrown edge of the abandoned field i walked to the old mill pond ... the tired stones rest calmly upon the edge of the fall line which is the beginning of the little gorge that cascades the soft water into the valley below, there to be carried by a great river to the distant sea ...
... perched upon my favorite igneous foundation block, in a spring day just warm enough that the mist from the leaking dam was cool promise of summer soon-to-be, i listened again to my father as he rhymed with the fluid casting of his self-made fly familiar tales of the ruins' ancient history ...
... there was, of course, the great trout which lived in the dark waters at the foot of the dam ... many had felt the sudden tug as he stole bait from hook, including my father, and, as i recalled, his father, too ... it was accepted locally as fact that if ever landed the fish would be of record size ... all of us had been warned to fear the mysterious antediluvian giant snapping turtle, "don't ever, ever let a hand dangle in the water," ... and, the young girl, her clothing carefully folded upon the shore, i am one who in the darkest of nights had heard her tearful sobs echoing from the stillness of the pond ...
.... pa glanced to the moss on the tree, up to the sun, and then to me ... i knew the quiz, "north side of the trunk, pa, but don't ever bet your life on it" ...
... as a small child, my dad fishing in the little stream, the old bridge was of my most cherished places to play ... when i became old enough to enter the woods by myself, it became more, a special sanctuary, a friend to which i could escape ... 
... pa would tell me of how when he was young the chain was only loosely wrapped around the tree, and how he regretted he hadn't then taken a hacksaw and cut it from the trunk ... eventually it will kill the tree, of course, but i've developed the feeling that this tree is still going to manage to live close to its natural lifespan ... the knot seems to smile at all who pass, "feel no pity for me, my species has inhabited this land a thousand times longer than yours, and, despite your foolish arrogance, we will be here long after your kind has vanished" ...
... "long, long ago on a beautiful spring day as is this, atop the middle of the stone arch, i first kissed your ma," pa would tell me ... i never got to say to him, "for me, my first such touch, it was sitting on the flat boulder at the base of the arch" ...
... in this place, all by myself, i will never be alone ...
... i cannot be alone here ...
... i cannot be alone here ...
... in my passing i leave behind me the idea that dead, alive, ending, and beginning, are anything but singular attributes of a greater concept ...
One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh:
but the earth abideth forever.
ECCLESIASTES 1:4
[THE STORY IS TRUE, I SET IT HERE BECAUSE IT FITS]