Backroads of Morrow County Update: Mystery June 9, 2014

It's great to have the time to just wander the back roads again. No need to be anywhere--let alone anywhere on time. The roads, of course, are more patch than pavement in many places. The wet spring has created some new potholes of its own to add to winter's destruction. I don't mind. As always, "go slow" is my favorite motto for wilderness meanderings. The fields are quite a patchwork themselves this spring. For some reason winter wheat is the favorite of my Morrow County neighbors. Must be a run on it on the commodities' exchange. Easily twice as much as usual. I am patiently waiting for amber waves of grain. Corn and soybean fields as well, but they are just starting to grow. Wet spring made for late planting. A lot of fields are still unplowed, and some farmers have resorted to night time plowing. Huge bright-eyed green monsters stalking the fields under starlit skies has been a regular occurrence this spring. There should be several hay crops! The grass in some fields is already deep and luscious. Can't wait for the haying to begin. I love those round bales decorating the hillsides on a sky blue canvas. The old cemetery across from my favorite little white-steepled Methodist church has been spruced up--even more inviting for a stroll. Several sheep "farms"--ranches?--dot the county. One has a llama guard; one has a mule. Cattle herds in places as well. One has black angus. One has black and white cows--I can never remember their name. Not many independent thinkers in a meadow of cows. They do like to hang out together. A few calves as well. One herd--the biggest--has a mixture of breeds, and a beautiful hillside pasture to wander. There's a copse of trees on one hill for loitering under on hot, sunny days. A stream runs down from the woods at the top of one of the hills. Huge red barn way at the top of another hill. Postcardish.
I have a few new roads picked out to wander later on this summer. But I do love those old ones I've grown accustomed to. And there's still the mystery road. Will the old man ever have the nerve to take it. It looks like a path trailing off to someone's house hidden behind the trees. Just one lane. Traveled. Has a stop sign though. That's the mystery. It must be a "real road." Who puts a stop sign on a driveway--even a long one to nowhere you can see? I've never actually seen a car on it. There's no mailbox at the end to signify a homestead. No street sign either. Mystery. Do I dare? Eh, Prufrock? Do I dare? If I disappear some day, and you can't find me at a dive drinking Pepsi and eating a fried bologna sandwich look for me on
the mystery "highway" of Morrow County. If you can find it . . .