after putting in a full day at work, one that stretched into the late hours of the evening, I return home, shuck out of my day clothes so as to sloth on my bed clothes, only to have a pocket full of change dribble onto the bedroom floor.

Working with kids, buying an ice cream here, movie treats there, one has the propensity to collect a great deal of change throughout the day. Today was no different, and in fact, I found myself laden with even more change than usual.

And, thanks to Alyx, who is a font of information on contemporary coins to pay attention to, I find myself scanning the scattered metal bits in the hopes that I may find a rarity, an inconsistency, something worth more than the amount stamped onto it.

Alas, no such luck this evening, at least as far as increasing my net worth is concerned.

Instead, I find myself the bearer of priceless conjourd memories...

...here...a quarter from 1976. It is aged enough that the moose head is worn, the crown of antlers less pronounced to the fingertips. I wonder how many games of Galaga and PacMan this quarter has played? How many treats of potato chips did it buy for an eager child at a time when they still came in foil bags and only cost twenty-five cents?

I was only seven years old in 1976. Beetles on wheels were everywhere, their drivers cranking tunes from The Eagles, Creedence, ABBA. Bell bottoms and Earth shoes were donned. I watched a lot of Match Game.

1976 was also the year that my father decided to retire from the military, a decision whose consequences forged a years long wedge between Dad and me, and altered the family's dynamic permanently. Dad and I are just now braving to cross that divide, and a great amount of gratitude goes to The Goddess for that one.

She gave me binoculars.

Because he was retired, we could no longer live on the base, and that summer, as I said good-bye to all my new friends from grade one, we moved to a rural community just a few kilometers away. Nevertheless, it bordered on the combat training area, and it was not unusual to be roused awake from the reverberations of mock battles being waged in the wee hours of the morning.

Little men with big killing toys.

Nevertheless, the lack of light pollution made visible little known celestial wonders to a seven year old, and in retrospect, it was an even trade. I became fascinated with the sky in 1976.

I still am.

That fall, I became a fledgling cub scout. It was there that, during a form of tag, I collided with Lowlandz. Indelible impressions, indeed. However, Lowlandz lived far enough away from me that our getting together was at the mercy of any parent willing to drive us, which was not too often. I, therefore, made tenuous friendships with three other boys in the vicinity. If we were not batting a ball, we were batting each other; never did we have the bond I came to enjoy with a select few I could usually only see at school, Low included.

In retrospect, it seems as though I developed my affinity for nature that year. If I was not laying on the grass, feeling the coolness of a light, fall evening breeze wash over my torso, gazing at Mother's glowing gems, then I was ambling through the woods.

Bordering the back of our property was a literal wall of blackberries. I will save the trauma of the annual blackberry harvest for another time. Yet, just past these thorny vines was a small grove of poplar trees, and other saplings such as maple and birch. Beyond this collection of spindles was, at least to a seven year old, a grand forest. It could not have extended more than a kilometer back before bordering on the training area, even less once the "new highway" was built. To a little me, though, and the extent of my wanderlust, it could have been Sherwood Forest.

It had a grand, evergreen canopy, and was webbed with children's footpaths carpeted in needles of pine and spruce. We four played hide and seek in those woods. We played tag, cops and robbers, and chase the girls. More often, however, as the years propelled me into depression and self loathing, I would find myself exploring the woodland alone.

Amidst the squirrels, raccoons, rabbits, mosquitos, frogs, crickets, robins, and ravens, I found peace. Peace from alienating and alien parents. Peace from my sister, with whom I argued constantly in that stereotypical sibling way. Peace from myself, even, who had an arduous time coping with the world around me.

I was bright; I was observant. I lived ashamed; I was overweight.

The soft crunch under my shoes of needles and past years' foliage always comforted me. I would eventually find my way to "the wall". It was a stone structure, a couple feet high, obviously man made, and the moss coated rocks and brush growing amidst the cracks and crevices suggested it was there for quite some time. It was sagging here, crumbling there, and as if the woods were growing right over it, the wall was encased in a mound of earth upon which the forest floor continued. Dad told me once, years later, that it could have been there for well over two hundred years.

Funny, he knew the place, too.

It always transfixed me. It seemed, at times of greatest sorrow, even to beckon me. In its seclusion far back into the woods, with the evergreens and hardwood standing guard, it had a soothing, radiant energy.

It stood the tests of time where I often felt I would not.

Sitting in front of it, gazing, my then fears and hurts would be absorbed into the stone, never to be unleashed. I would remain there for what seemed then to be an eternity, until my limbs started to fall asleep, my eyelids became heavy, and I could feel every pine needle in my backside.

This quarter was minted almost its value ago. A lot has happened since then. My play buddies have grown up, gone their separate ways, and I seldom see them. At last report, one was incarcerated for domestic violence. Another is perpetually uprooted; he is a musician who cannot seem to find solid ground. The last, a special effects makeup artist, actually did some work for The X-Files.

The blackberry bushes and sapling grove are gone now. Dad and Mom had to put in a new septic field one year, and sadly, that is where it went. But the grass is really green.

Tragically, my woods are gone now, too. The evergreens were thinned, made virtually extinct, so that some neighbours could be warm one winter while the rabbits, squirrels, raccoons, and ravens either froze to death or moved on that year. From behind, a subdivision creeps slowly forward, and the brown carpet of needles and decaying foliage has made way for grey concrete foundations. Looking out my parents' kitchen window at night, one sees the lights through other kitchen windows instead of a drak, rich woodland extending into a star filled sky.

And the wall, well, it was disrespected, dismantled, uprooted, destroyed, along with everything else in the name of consumption and progress. I wish in grief I had had the presence of mind years ago, when last I visited, to take one of the flat, smooth stones and carry it home.

I guess it did not stand the tests of time after all. But I know now that I will.

For sometimes, when my depression is forcing me to succumb, when my spirit feels dark, when my eyes cannot see any light, when my body cannot feel, I close my eyes and travel there still, until I feel the tingle of pine needles on my backside once again.

A pocket full of change, indeed.

Be Well