BACK OF THE BOOK On simple joys

By Lyndsie Kiebert-Carey Reader Staff

I listened to the creek roar past as I attempted to unlace my double-knotted boots. The sound of freshly melted snowpack rushing over rounded mountain granite drowned out every other noise — the dog panting next to me; my husband navigating blowdowns in the nearby woods in search of morels; my sister, also creekside, seated five feet away and shedding her own boots.

I got one boot, then the other, tucked safely between some dry rocks and proceeded to peel off my socks, balling them up and shoving them into a single boot with childish abandon. They’d be a problem for later — an off-the-mountain problem, like text messages or showering.

Pivoting to my left, I dropped both of my pale, winter feet into the creek. Only the water heard me as I exhaled a sharp, “Brrr, that’s cold!”

The chill shot to the tops of my sweaty shoulders, and soon, the tips of my ears. I spent 10 minutes playing a game I learned very young: I dipped my feet for as long as I could stand it, and, once I was sure my bones were the same temperature as the smooth stones beneath my toes, I’d lift them back into the sun. Dip and lift, dip and lift. The creek washed away the sticky heat of the hike, as well as the dark numbness of winter.

I smiled to myself as I watched my pup and sister experience the same sensation — Leslie performing her own routine of dipping and lifting while Mac hopped off and onto the bank, helping herself to small sips of the world’s freshest water while she was at it.

The simplest joys rear their sleepy heads in spring. They reveal themselves in the scent of the grass just as the morning sun hits it and in the breeze coming off the lake, teeming with movement and new life. These simple joys exist in the sound of birdsong and booming thunderstorms; the taste of rhubarb and wild mushrooms. They babble from beneath several feet of untouched mountain snow and ramble over waterfalls, under sun-bleached cedar stumps and past exhausted feet and paws, soon to spend a short-lived summer on Lake Pend Oreille. Simple joys abound in spring.

In my mind, this time of year in North Idaho is a short window onto actual perfection. I stand under the blossoming branches of an apple tree planted so long ago that it has seen triple my number of springs, looking up, and my eyes well. I can no longer make out the difference between the rustling petals and the bees bumbling between them. I am overwhelmed by the perfection, and struggle to believe that anyone else has ever noticed this window.

Still, I know they have. I can’t be the only one who, when given the opportunity to do “whatever I wanted” on a sunny May Sunday, told my husband we’d be lacing up our boots and traipsing up a mountain.

“And I want to put my feet in some water afterward,” I added — a simple request for a simple joy.

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Word Week of the

of words.

“While most students were dreading the standardized test, a few plucky logophiles were excited to learn the words that would likely appear in the reading section.”

Corrections: Nothing to note. Either the red pen warriors took a week off, or we really did get it right this time. —LKC