November started tremendously warm for the first few hours in Connecticut then quickly dropped its temperature like the trees letting going of their last leafs. I hiked Hurd State Park on Saturday, one of the last places to hold on to autumn colors thanks to its proximity to the Connecticut River. My short-legged chihuahua/terrier Gordo and I headed to the Split Rock look out through small sections in of yellow and red leafs on bigger trees with smaller naked brother trees around them. At the top I found what I thought was a couple, a man and woman slightly behind older than me and I offered to take their picture together. They were quick to explain they were brother and sister (I didn’t know them and it was not important information at first). The man referred to the woman has his “little sister” as I took the photo.
As we talked I explained how my sister had just moved cross country for the second time in her life and how I missed doing things like a hike with her (we did so little together when she was near by due to work and family time constraints). I explained how I didn’t expect the cross country move and the woman told me how she too had moved in Colorado multiple times, as my sister did in the past. It was a very pleasant conversation but Gordo was ready to move on so I left them to finish their hike alone.
I keep thinking about the two of them the rest of the hike and thinking of the photo I took for them, wondering if I caught the moment correctly. I took a photo of my son back to back with my sister a few months back and they were almost the same height. Who will be taller when they see each other again? I spent my whole childhood with my sister but most of my adult life away from her. We look nothing alike; I’m a foot taller than her and we have different eye and hair color. But we have so many random things in common. We’d talk and find we liked the same TV shows or had very similar world views.
I’ll miss her but when she comes back, I’ll take her to hike Hurd on a day where the last bit of summer that exists in autumn is holding on.
