Benevolence

I will travel to Iowa this afternoon, and traverse about 250 miles of empty corn fields in the dark. The emptiness of the land will cause me to rethink my life--what I should have done differently, and what I might still do differently. My imagination will run wild to no practical effect. Nothing will change.

I do not despise my imagination just because it is often impractical. It has worked well enough through the years to keep body and soul together. My imagination and the good people I have known are the history of my life. I often forget it was the benevolence of others made my life well worth living. I am thankful even though I don’t say it much.

I can already see the little farm towns, products of the benevolence of the land and the imagination, sprinkled along highway 30.