I celebrated my 37Th birthday this past Friday with a visit to Franklin Canyon, nestled in the Santa Monica Mountains, just west of Coldwater Canyon Blvd. The most direct way to Franklin Canyon from my house on Robertson and Airdrome is straight down Beverly Drive, which also happens to be the center of the Beverly Hills shopping district. Images of cars and pedestrians competing for tiny areas of space on this crowded road convinced me to go north on Robertson Blvd instead. Being unfamiliar with the area, I was unaware of the attraction of the local shops that line this busy thoroughfare. I then thought I would outsmart traffic and make my way to Sunset Blvd. through side streets, which on any other day would have been a brilliant idea. But on this day, there was road construction down the little side street I turned and I was routed back to Robertson Blvd. My next futile attempt at dodging the afternoon traffic was to turn west on Melrose Ave. I watched as pedestrians casually strolled past my car parked in traffic and envied their enjoyment of the warm sunshine of a perfect summer afternoon.
My first goal was to cross Sunset Blvd, which I finally did after 30 minutes. My next goal was to reach Coldwater Canyon Blvd. which is the windy road that leads to Franklin Canyon from Beverly Hills. Traffic was just as horrific however traveling west on Sunset, so I decided to set my own course for Coldwater Canyon. The broad shoulders of mansions hovering over the threadlike streets of North Beverly Hills hindered my ability to navigate these tiny canyons as I cautiously drove up and down sharp, harrowing inclines. After turning left and then right, and again left and right, I eventually found a small residential street that intersected with Coldwater Canyon Blvd. However, I still needed the kind assistance of a security guard sitting at his post in front of a gated community before I finally arrived at my intended destination an hour after I left home.
At this point, I wanted nothing more than to find a quiet spot and enjoy the beautiful afternoon sun glistening through the canyon. When I finally took my first step out of my automobile, I was immediately intoxicated by the bright canyon colors that reflected the beaming rays of the sun back into the blue sky above. I started walking down the road in the direction of a body of water called Heavenly Pond. I strolled under the protection of tall oak woodlands providing shade to the mindful traveler with its tall branches reaching over the road and joining hands like lovers walking along together in a quiet meadow. The road eventually twisted out of the shade and into the sunlight where I spotted a young boy wearing a colorful kippah that covered his entire head, similar to the one I was wearing. His mother turned her head as I walked by and she beamed, "Look someone else who keeps Shabbat." I smiled at her and graciously replied back, "Shabbat Shalom."
I walked right past the hidden entrance to Heavenly Pond and continued on my way. Not wanting to retrace my steps, I once again looked at my map and I located Sycamore Meadow which sat on the shores of Wild Pond. This seemed an appropriate destination, since a meadow usually provides the perfect scenery for a writer to express his erupting thoughts and feelings as its open spaces of soft green grass are adept at absorbing the lava that flows from the exploding volcano of a restless heart. A paved pedestrian path led from the loop road and into the enclave of Sycamore Meadow resting on the shores of Wild Pond. I followed this path which led to a secluded area shaded by the thick branches of a towering oak woodland. Awaiting me was a picnic table shrouded in secrecy underneath the low laying branches of an especially majestic oak tree. I ducked to avoid a collision between my head and one of these mammoth branches as I took my place at the picnic table.
The twinkle of the late afternoon sun glowing off dangling green leaves brought a particularly serene harmony to Wild Pond at Sycamore Meadow. I found the calm inside my heart to unleash a fury of bottled up emotion onto a generous piece of legal tab paper while the pond not more than 10 feet away from the table quietly basked in the warmth of a midsummer's day. When the totality of my wrath was fully spent I stood to stretch my cramped legs. I slowly walked over to the pond where I was met by a child running excitedly towards its edge. "What is he wearing on his head," she asked her mother who was trailing her daughter only a few feet behind. The older woman looked up, took notice of my head covering and greeted me in a warm and approving manner, "Shalom".
Minutes passed and the excited shrill of the little girl was soon silenced by the tranquility of Wild Pond as a mother duck arrived at the scene with a duckling closely trailing behind. There was the sound of splashing every few seconds when the mother duck quickly bobbed her head in and out of the motionless pond as she caught in her beak small bits of vegetation floating just beneath the water's surface. The mother than located her baby and fed into his beak the provisions she provided. The child next to me took three steps forward towards the pond and I said to her, "Be careful so you do not scare them away." She stopped in her tracks, but by then the mother duck and her baby had waddled away, sufficiently nourished from the calm and serenity found at Wild Pond at Sycamore Meadow nestled in Franklin Canyon.
It was now time for me to leave. I was still upset though that it took me an hour to travel seven miles and that I persisted in finding a way through the busy streets of West Los Angeles without getting stuck in the maddening traffic when perhaps it would have been better to go the way I knew, no matter how congested the roads. But sometimes in life we do not choose our journeys, rather our journeys choose us. If I had not driven the exact route I took or stopped at one of the many red lights I encountered on the way, I would have just missed crossing paths with a woman and her boy whose religious traditions I share. I also would not have stood hypnotized on the banks of quiet water next to an inquisitive child and her family as together we witnessed the mesmerizing spectacle of a mother duck feeding her young. So, would I have traded the long, windy, and unpredictable road that led me to Wild Pond at Sycamore Meadow on my 37Th birthday for a safer and more familiar way? Ask the same question to a mother who has just endured 12 hours of torturous labor giving birth to the newborn baby she now cradles in her nurturing arms.
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