seeing green

The sky as seen from the fire tower one evening a couple nights ago. In the tower the world seems to slow down. You hear sounds from animals whose names you can only pathetically attempt to guess. Heavy footsteps, scampering, rustling, hooting, croaking, chirping. Even the wasps that have papered homes in the box at the top of the tower make a strange hum I hadn't noticed before.

One of the most astonishing things about seeing the plateau from there in the summertime is the immensity of the space covered by trees. Trees of all shades of green and endless shapes as far as the eye can see, until the Tennessee River beyond South Pittsburg and until the plateau drops off in the northwest. (Here is a good example.) We live in a beautiful place. The whole world is not so lucky.