The Belle

Teddi decided where we went today. Normally we stay to the right at the path's fork, left takes us down to the riverwalk and right to the Greenway. Teddi was walking ahead of me, and she started left. I said, “No,” and I moved past her with the intent of staying on the Greenway. She came up behind me and tapped my right hand with her muzzle. This is usually her indication to me that it is time for me to pay the love tax. Generally, if I acknowledge her tap, she'll sit down and let me straddle her from behind and envelope her with my upper body, I hunch over and give her kisses on top of her snout while she leans into my left leg and rests. Then I give her a pat on her haunch and say, “Let’s go,” and she springs forward and off we go until it is time to pay the love tax again.

It's been that way for years. Today though, she didn't sit down. She started left, stopped, looked back at me, walked a little further and stopped and looked back at me again. I chuckled and said, “OK." Then I started left. There's this little prance she does when we make the right choice. That's what she did today.

Glad I made the choice, too.

Down river there is a historical plaque that I did not notice on my one and only time passing this spot on the Savannah River Walk. It commemorates an archaeological dig from around 2005 that established the extent to which the indigenous Mississippian culture occupied the site. The broad area is on a raised flat plane overlooking the river. The team doing the dig found that the site contained extensive planned agriculture, a large palisade, and about eighty structures within its walls. Many interior small holding sites featured garden plots adjacent to them, presumably for each inhabitant’s personal use. Today, the whole nine plus acres is dedicated to luxury homes and a sport and shopping complex.

It is what it is.

On the way back, from one of the McMansions across the street, three women emerged and crossed the street. They got on the path just ahead of Teddi and me. One, a beautiful young woman in her late twenties and she was dressed to kill. She had on a formal skirt made from the richest fabric, the color of which was variegated in the colors of a peacock feather. Her blouse, made from the same rich fabric was the color of the deepest blue green from her skirt. Her hair was piled on her head, imitating classical Roman hairstyles with loose braids elegantly configured. She held her skirt up off the cement path just above her ankles, revealing a pair of white sandals on her feet, at least they were originally white; because I don't think they had ever been cleaned since she started wearing them. It didn't ruin the effect though; it just brought it down to earth.

Her two companions were stylishly dressed in upscale casual outfits and they both sported very similar dyed blond hairstyles that women of a certain age wear. Both women were in their late forties. My guess is they were sisters, and they were related to the young woman, one likely the mother and the other an aunt. All three women had the same facial features with high cheekbones and aquiline noses. They walked alongside her, one carrying an expensive camera with a wide-angle lens and the other carried the belle’s fashionable dress shoes.

They were clearly on a mission. The trio made their way down to a brick pavilion with an enormous fireplace on its leeward wall. The whole architectural affect is sort of neo-plantation style. Beautiful, but not offensive. I said to the trio, "Looks like somebody is on their way to a photoshoot." None of them looked at me. They just kept walking.

"Cause nobody would dress like that for a walk?” Still, they did not look at me, but uttered a collective giggle. "But if you did, it sure looks like you made the right choice." Once more, no eye contact. And once more, a little nervous laughter. I am sure they were thinking, "I hope this old geezer will shut up and keep walking!"

There's no fool like an old fool.