Somewhere in Ohio

The writer Wallace Stegner noted that to appreciate the American West, a person must “get over green.”

The west is dry.  You cannot expect to regularly see sweeping expanses of green fields and broad leafy things in your surround.  Rain may not visit some places for weeks or months.  Jagged stone and raw earth defines entire regions.  The views are often expansive.  You may see a tail of dust rising from a truck driving over dirt roads three or four miles in the distance.  The sky holds the clouds high above.

Ohio is not the West.  Ohio is green.

The clouds are low.

We got here around green, through green, in green.

Yesterday, we drove through several heavy downpours.  The sky remained gray and low from beginning to end.  The view was limited from nearest rise to nearest rise.  We seemed wading through trees, new corn, and tall grass. 

Somewhere in Ohio—during my stay—I hope to find a place that helps me understand this green better.  I need to touch it.

--Mitchell Hegman