“Patience ~ Wood Frog,” an original acrylic painting on watercolor paper, copyright Susan A. Walton, S. A. Walton Studio Hudson, Florida

Artist’s note:

When I was just a toddler and my brothers were off hunting squirrels up in the hills, Mom would keep me out of their way by having me play in the little creek behind our little weekend getaway house we called The Shack.

There was a tiny hand-built wooden bridge which crossed over the creek there, and below it, on the downstream side, some long-ago gardener with an artistic spirit had made a broad basin of cement to briefly corral and delay the flow of the creek, and put it to use as making music.

The basin’s design included a level and wide brim, with a dark hollow area beneath that served to amplify the sound of the water that poured over the edge into the wild creek. When the water slipped free again over the rim, it dropped past the little hollow concealed beneath, which gave the brook a charming and resonant song, and went on its babbling, merry way.

Needless to say, I loved that creek and that water feature. Not only was it pleasant and refreshing for us to hear this waterfall’s music all day, the associated basin also doubled as a cool refuge for water striders and wood frogs, and there were always at least a handful enjoying the pooled water beneath the foot bridge.

Age had made the artificial structure look more like natural stone; moss and lichen adorned it in places, and there were chips in it from debris washed down in past flash floods, lending it character. I would stand on the bridge and peer over the rail to watch the frogs below without alarming them.

Sometimes, if it was hot, I would creep down to the water and join them, careful to look for snakes which also sometimes partook of the water. Snakes looked for the frogs with other intentions on their minds than companionship, of course, and if there were no frogs visible there was a good chance that a snake was lurking about and the amphibians were all in hiding. It was wise to just stay on the bridge or play upstream.

I always wondered about whoever it was that made the concrete basin, for such unnecessary and purely creative things as hidden garden waterfalls are only made out of love. Proud and spiteful people don’t bother to create discrete and beautiful

things under footbridges, not in this part of the country, at least. I would have liked to know more about the gardener who lived here and who, with a simple adjustment, and investment of precious time, made this part of the world a better place.

Was it a love of life, a love of nature, a love of gardening, for the love of the birds that bathed here, or was it a gift for a loved one? I will never know, but I do know the person or persons left some part of themselves and their love in the place, and though it was never intended for me, I was still blessed by the gesture.

—- Susan A. Walton

Description:

Richly fitted in a copper finished wood Larson Juhl frame and cotton mats and ready to go, this little original painting of a wood frog lounging in a clear little Ozark creek could be yours or a loved one’s.

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