A Twilight Stroll

A good walk clears the mind, puts things into perspective. Sometimes the hardest questions in life can be answered by walking into the forest.
Hard questions from the mind which are answered gently with our souls.
Early tonight I felt the need to walk amongst nature and inhale fresher air.
Like Moses answering the call to climb a mountain, I slipped into my flip-flops and walked in the direction of a local park.
Six months ago we moved into a new house within walking distance to schools, various fast food chains, cafes and restaurants.
 What used to be rich farming land has become a nice slice of suburbia surrounded by rain-forest. Its idylic for people who want that small-town feel with a twenty minute drive into the city and a ten minute drive to big shopping centres and cinemas.

I put my head-phones on and listened to it for half a song before yielding to my inner wisdom demanding I be present in the presense of nature. This wasn't my morning stroll to the bus stop for work. This was about me being present with my thoughts, to untangle the mental knots in my head by inhaling the fresh smell of moss, hearing the calls of birds and hearing the best of my heart-beat in the silence.
I see a beaten path just off the man-made track and I'm wondering why people wanted to go in that direction? Where does the beaten path lead to? A destination or a pretty walk? I want to find out but its beginning to get too dark to explore so I head back.

As I walked leisurely along the track in the fading twilight. Its an orange sun-set, hopeful and optimistic before the street-lights come on.
On my way back home bats are flying overhead, screeching like witches and they fly high, low and in every which direction, they are so close I can hear the swoop of their wings.

Sometimes we need to step out into nature to understand that the world is bigger than anything we are thinking.
I'm glad I gave into that inner nudge not to plug my ears otherwise I would not have heard what I heard and see what I saw with such detail. I couldn't tell you all the thoughts that were going through my head, but during that ten minute trail walk I felt like I was in the moment and just marvelling at the beauty surrounding me that until earlier tonight, I had no idea existed a five minute walk away from my home.
As for that beaten path, I'm going to find out where it leads the next time I have a yen for a nature stroll.