Faded Days of Yore

I see this older gentlemen sitting outside of his house.  He's hard not to notice. His house is on my drive to work and is set unusually close to the road.  It also so happens he's usually wearing a bathrobe. I do not say this to set him in that kooky neighborhood man light or to denigrate him in anyway.  It's almost like that bathrobe has become a ceremonial badge of honor in my eyes - he's earned the right to wear it whether I know why or not.  This man appears old, I mean like, really old.

This man lives on my way to and from work so I see him fairly regularly.  Mostly he's sitting in a chair on his small front porch, nodding off in the sun.  Sometimes he's sitting in his yard, a gloriously huge green sloping rolling hillside of a yard, on a white lounge chair, also sleeping. Once I saw him mowing the lawn and that seemed like a huge event - he's awake! He's moving!  The next day I drove by and the lawn mower was stopped in one corner of that gloriously sprawling yard, only one small neat square of mowed lawn against the mostly un-mowed sloping, rolling hillside of lawn.

Why this man intrigues me I don't know. He just does.  Many times I've slowed down in my car as I pass by the house and he's sitting or sleeping on the porch.  I tell myself this time I'll stop.  But my car rolls on and I don't.  I may give a wave through my window if I notice he's awake or if this woman I see sometimes happens to be outside too.  What would be my reason to stop?  How could I explain that I see something so peaceful and...worthy in this man and his naps?

The other day I passed the house and this man yet again. Only this time, he was standing closer to the road directly behind these tall, orange lilies and he was all dressed up.  He had on blue jeans, a button down shirt, and a clean white cowboy hat atop his head.  He looked like a new man!  I thought of stopping and this time, finally introducing myself and making up something like I am an Instagram reporter, reporting on local Vermonters and their lives...Yet again, my car rolled on.  But as I passed him, the sun slanted down just so that it was as though he was caught in a stop motion picture, he was framed and back-dropped by the sunlight so perfectly.  And more melodramatically, but real - he looked up and smiled this dashing, happy smile at me as I drove past.

Maybe I'll meet this man and learn the story of his life, his farm, and how he's come to nap in the afternoons.  Or maybe I won't and I'll continue to see him in a technicolor, dream world of lazy days, never ending lawns, and a life well lived.