May 17, 1852. P.M. To Loring’s Pond.
Decidedly fair weather at last; a bright, breezy, flowing, washing day. I see that dull-red grass whose blades, having risen above the surface of the water.... Perhaps a slightly rosaceous tint to it.
The different color of the water at different times would be worth observing. To-day it is full of light and life, the breeze presenting many surfaces to the sun. There is a sparkling shimmer on it. It is a deep, dark blue, as the sky is clear. The air everywhere is, as it were, full of the rippling of waves. This pond is the more interesting for the islands in it. The water is seen running behind them, and it is pleasant to know that it penetrates quite behind and isolates the land you see, or to see it apparently flowing out from behind an island with shining ripples.
To-day the cinquefoils ... on the hill sides shine in the sun. Their brightness becomes the day. That is a beautiful footpath through the pitch pines on the hillside north of this pond, over a carpet of tawny pine leaves, so slippery under your feet. Why do not men sprinkle these over their floors instead of sand? The sun on the young foliage of birches, alders, etc., on the opposite side of the pond has an enchanting effect. The sunshine has a double effect. The new leaves abet it, so fresh and tender, not apprehending their insect foes. Now the sun has come out ..., how bright, how full of freshness and tender promise and fragrance is the new world! The woods putting forth new leaves; it is a memorable season. So hopeful! These young leaves have the beauty of flowers. .... I see dark pines in the distance in the sunshine, contrasting with the light fresh green of the deciduous trees.
There is life in these fresh and varied colors, life in the motion of the wind and the waves.... It is a good day to saunter. The female crimson flowers of the sweet-gale are still conspicuous. .... After a storm at this season, the sun comes out and lights up the tender expanding leaves, and all nature is full of light and fragrance, and the birds sing without ceasing, and the earth is a fairyland. ....
Methinks they were turtle doves which I saw this afternoon....
-H.D.T.
May 17, 2021.
At 12:45 p.m. I arrive at Warner’s Pond, slightly bigger, but equivalent to Loring’s Pond of Thoreau’s Day. A wide expanse of yellow cinquefoils and red-tinged sheep’s sorrel greet me from the unkept roadside field next to the parking lot. At just over 70 degrees with a bold sunny sky it feels hot, akin to a "washing day" in Thoreau's time, when laundry was cleaned and hung out to dry.
I enter the small, cleared field above the pond on its north shore, the location of a former house removed a number of years ago. By Scout Island, which beautifies this waterscape, five Canada geese play and splash in the water, occasionally honking. Redwings busily move about the trees along the shore. A cricket, chirping in the tall grass, flies away, again and again, as I pursue it for a closer look. Ripples within the pond surface continually emerge from movement below the water. Wisps of feathery dandelion seeds float everywhere in the breeze from the west, creating a magical, fairyland feel to this moment and place. The very reflective water mirrors the clouds and trees of the island to doubly enhance the splendor.
I find a path along the northern edge of the pond over tawny needles through pitch pines, just as Thoreau describes. In fact, I find many pitch pines on the north side of the pond here, including along the Bruce Freeman bike path, still being constructed. The light filters through the new, pale-green, tender leaves along the shore. I see a small black creature scurry down a tree trunk and disappear - a fisher? But wait, am I imagining it?; did that really happen? A green arrow arum, with arrow shaped leaves, rises from the water at the pond’s edge.
For my first time, I go further into the massive farm fields, today being tended to by tractor, which lie further west. As Thoreau describes, the hill beyond shows a long distinct line of the lighter green of the deciduous trees below the darker pine trees above. The field is thick with a uniform pale green grass crop, interspersed with crimson clover flowers, distinctly different than the more green grass on the other side of the trail and tractor path outside of what is being actively farmed. Along the fields' eastern edge where I walk, I find a great many dandelions, one group fresh and yellow, and another their fairy counterparts with ghostly white seedheads, the source of the flying wisps in the breeze. Large amounts of yellow creeping buttercups and bitter wintercress, with occasional cuckoo flowers, also dot the landscape. In one location, on the western edge of the pond, the crimson clover dominates the field in an expanse of red.
As I move toward Nashoba Brook, I scare up about six mourning doves (Thoreau's turtle doves) from the grasses, which abruptly flutter to safety in the trees. Looking back north, I can see Route 2 with cars busily rushing by, but I am so deep in this huge field that the traffic sound barely reaches me. At the brook, a picnic table and calm view of the water await; it feels a bit like a secret place, under-visited and deserving of more time for contemplation and exploration - but time which I don't have enough of today. I retreat, back to the world of business.
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