Southwood Lands

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From a lunchtime prowl in the rainy Southwood Lands, which is the decommissioned golf course adjacent to the University of Manitoba. I was hoping to see a raptor or two—I've had good luck there over the past few years—but the dead trees were empty.

There was a single pair of ducks in one of the retention ponds. Other than that, Southwood felt emptied out. No geese. A few small songbirds. There was just the rain and chill in the air.

So I walked hard and listened to the rain on the hood of my jacket and waited for my body to warm up. There were more dead trees but the grasses were green and there were new mushrooms, slicked down by rain.

The Southwood Lands are scrubby, overgrown, beautiful. So: more like a forest and less like a golf course. The only thing is: it doesn't feel like a healthy forest.

I'm committed to walking Southwood until it's gone. 

(The bottom image, if you're wondering, is of a golf ball in it's natural habitat. I found it at the base of a grove of trees...)