Open Fields
Sunday, February 1st, 2009
Grown high before the harvest and now barren with dust, the cornfields wait in the winter-weak sunshine for the plans to be drawn. The suburban neighborhoods start to ring outward some miles from the city’s industrial edges and the development finally stops a mile from this open ground. These fields were thick last autumn, but this late in winter produce knee-high dirt clouds with the wind’s help that spin out in the gullied crop rows.
Overhead geese families collect in the blueness – one small V-shape joining a larger group and fluttering off together according to their internal maps passed down through generations. So many landmarks familiar to them have been scraped clean and replaced with roads or modern structures that their whole navigation system might one day be displaced. This evening all is peaceful, and the birds are silent as though they were added with brush strokes to the landscape and the near springlike weather. Fading sunlight turns the dirt orange and colors the rust and draws out shadows from the small, home-made oil spiggots.
I write a mile from this rural scene and yet seldom come out here to be inspired. Some new houses have come up and a neighborhood park has been added, which makes this place a frequent visit for my family in the spring and summer. The drive is merely a means to an end, though. The asphalt roads worn down to gravel churn under the wheels while I attempt to answer questions from the back seat from excited children or tune the radio to a sound they prefer and the fields roll past. I’m oblivious to the scenery. I hadn’t been on the drive in so long and it was likely to be another few months until it warmed for good that I was careful to take it in since I woudn’t be there again.
This is the Midwest. The land keeps getting torn up so that more houses can be built free from the urban environment. Roots to the farm land and God and country are still strong in this region, as generations, in some cases, work to keep life simple and familiar. The underlieing feeling, though, is that nothing great is being last in the development. Another corn field gone or another pasture dug out to become a lake is no real significant loss. The houses keep going up and the farms that were once isolated are now neighbors to multi-family dwellings and soon afterward, strip malls and convenience stores. The trend started some 30 miles away and in the last 30 years has come out this far, to the city’s ends in all directions.
I have heard people complain about long drives in this state – that there isn’t much to see and that the views aren’t entertaining. The notion is that a farm field is boring and unattractive. Nothing beautiful can be found in them or nothing unique. Let them go for something more engaging or useful. These views are in need of as much correction as the viwer’s eyes. Open fields that roll out in a canvas for the clouds moving in shadows across the ground are a thing to behold, not to put asunder. While I spend summer mornings driving my own children from neighborhood to neighborhood, I plan to impart a lesson with them. Nature is the real beauty to behold and it can be even more so when you find it in the plainest places, untouched from the rushing days.
