A Beauty Diviner on a November Bike Ride
Is there anything beautiful about brown?
Issue #41
Brown.
I knew that was what awaited me as I pedaled my bike through the neighborhood toward the beginning of the trail. I knew what to expect because a few days ago I’d walked the path and discovered to my dismay that November had turned my path of many colors into three shades of brown.
Boring. Blah. Monotone. That’s what I had to look forward to.
Unlike previous seasons:
In my mind brown felt like a negative space, a void previously occupied by color. Brown was the vanilla flavor of the natural world, it was a background to make the real colors stand out more.
Once when I was walking with my husband on the same path a few years ago he exclaimed: “I love all the brown!” He didn’t say it with sarcasm but with admiration and joy.
“It’s brown because everything’s dead,” I replied.
If anyone was meant to love brown, it would be my husband. We tease him about it still, about how it fits with his optimistic personality. He believes there is always something good in every person and situation and in that moment he saw the “good” in the color brown.
Brown has actually come up in our marriage before. He likes dark wood floors, I like light wood floors. If we see a country house with a lot of wood showing on the inside while we’re watching tv, he’ll say, “You would paint all of that white wouldn’t you?” Of course, I say. The main two colors in his home office: blue and brown. The main colors in the rest of our house: bright white walls with splashes of blue and orange and green (except for the dark wood floors that were here before we moved in).
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On my way to the greenway, I tried to prepare myself to be underwhelmed but my previous bike rides had trained me to find beauty on this trail. Like one of those old water diviners with a rod in hand, I couldn’t help but open my senses and tune into my surroundings.
Accompanying me on this particular journey (via podcast) was On Being’s Krista Tippet and poet Clint Smith.
I’d only been on the greenway a few minutes when I was struck by how the late afternoon sun made the ordinary brown field shimmer like a jewelry box full of topaz.
Around another corner, the light filtered through the varied textures of brown and transformed everything into gold.
I stood ankle deep in the grass at the edge of the field to get a photo, suddenly aware that I was capturing the beauty of brown and I would have to eat crow when I got back home.
What my husband doesn’t know won’t hurt him, said the devil on my shoulder.
Between Clint Smith in my ear with his deep reflections about the world and the Midas touch on everything around me, I was already a bundle of sensitive nerve endings, divining beauty on my bike ride.
And the beauty wasn’t over yet.
As I got back on my bike a bell rang out behind me and to my delight a two-seater bike raced past me. During my many bike rides on this particular path, I’d never seen a tandem bike.
Next I caught a glimpse of two deer disappearing into the brush.
Then I saw a white tree illuminated, as if the sun was a black light creating an iridescent white glow from the two trunks and their branches.
Soon after that my bike ride came to an end.
As much as my husband is known in our family for being a brown enthusiast, I’m known for telling on myself. I knew it was time for my confession.
I was pretty certain I could bring myself to admit to my husband that brown, under the right circumstances, could be beautiful. But I will stand by my opinion that vanilla is not a flavor.
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What about you? Have you found beauty this week where you didn’t expect it?
Continue the Journey
A Poem
Listen to a poem written and read by Clint Smith.
A Podcast
Here’s the podcast I listened to on my bike ride the following day.
Blessings from the Guest Nest,
-Aimee
P.S.—Thanks so much for reading! You can support the writing and art I share each week by donating to my art supply fund.
I love this posting in so many ways.
but you are wrong about vanilla.
I love these photos of the brown turned to gold in the sunlight. Proof that the right lighting is transformative!