A Perfect Day in George F Canyon By Deborah Paul

A Perfect Day in George F Canyon

By Deborah Paul

I recently took my dog Lambchop for a walk in George F Canyon on the most perfect day. The sun was filtering through the purple sage as bees, housed in their honey-dripping, termite-infested oak by the bridge were were making their busy rounds. A couple of Palos Verdes Blues were sampling the nearest deer weed. Poison oak, thriving heartily in spite of its scheming motive, was plentiful and verdant.

 I removed a raggety spider web in front of the entrance to the tree hive so the bees could come and go without tedious arial acrobatics. I figured the absent arachnid could easily spin another home a few branches away and everyone would be happy.

 No one else was in the canyon, but my dog and me with a few sparrows and finches trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. In the distance, I heard a peacock calling to a mate, but no one answered. Lambchop shuffled along the path zeroing in on the most delicious aromas. Coyotes, possums, raccoons and bunnies are her elusive, but favorite scents. No matter how fierce or lithe she thinks she is, the poodle mix has never caught anything remotely wild.

 The terrier in her caught a lizard once, but that’s because I accidentally dropped a board on the poor little creature while trying to show the excited dog where gecko was hiding. The plywood slipped out of my hands as I lifted the wood up. Bungling acts like that haunt my dreams, and I was really sorry that happened. Lambchop was fast as lighting catching the prone lizard, and mercifully ended my sad plight.

But on this day in the canyon, everything was green and wonderful from a recent drizzle. As we walked along the path, hard packed with horse shoe prints and earthy hints of happy steed and their riders, a dark blue butterfly began fluttering around my head. “Hi there, pretty butterfly,” I said to God’s magnificent winged creature. “Are you having a good day?” The butterfly was so tame, for a second I felt like Snow White roaming the forest.

He or she swooped in close to me, then back off while I cooed and fawned over its beauty. During one rare and amazing second as I stood stock still, the butterfly swept in and kissed me on the head. It fluttered in a dainty circle or two then sped away.

The butterfly followed me down the canyon for a few hundred yards and landed on a post only a couple feet away from me. “Little Dark Blue” posed long enough for me to take a short video on my phone. Rare and wondrous moments like this fill my life. Anyone can have them, but we need to purposely staunch the usual helter skelter of living in the South Bay.

 Like making a conscious effort to pinch off a crumble of rosemary and breathe in its distinctive aroma. At times, I tear off leaves of minty sage and rub it all over Lambchop’s fur just to treat her to wild, woodsy tones of camphor and anise.

Other times, I stop to look at the sunlight through petals to trace veins that that suspiciously look like ones prominently taking up space on my aging hands. The life-giving fluids God has apportioned -- water for the leaves, blood for me -- is never to be under appreciated in it’s complicated simplicity. Though the lives of leaves are more fleeting than the duration of a human life, their vivifying artistry should not go ignored.

So while walking in George F Canyon amidst the quiet and manifold presence of a creative, loving God, I sing when nobody can hear. I watch beetles at work and witness wildflowers present their opulence to all passersby. And I always pray no one comes upon me in my own blissful, simplistic world talking unabashedly to butterflies and hummingbirds.

Deborah Paul has played with ink since she was able to read and write. At 19, after two years of college, she left St. Louis to fly for American Airlines, and later enjoyed a long career with Flying Tiger Lines in many capacities, including flying military and their dependents all over the world as a flight attendant. Paul returned to university in the 1990s earning a journalism degree from Cal State University Dominguez Hills and was eventually hired as a newspaper reporter for the South Bay Weekly section of the Los Angeles Times. A decade later she worked for Orange Coast Magazine as their Charitable Events editor. She also taught journalism and was advisor to the campus newspaper at CSUDH and still contributes as a regular stringer for Peninsula News on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. Currently, she has self-published four-of-five children's books in her ballad series. Her poetic fictional stories are inspired by real people who have left an indelible mark on the quiet display of simple human kindness. She resides in Rancho Palos Verdes married to Jim, her husband of many adventures.