Rocks’ Tiny Offspring

GRAVEL. What is it?

That is a question I have been pondering lately, and I believe the residents of Moose County deserve an answer. Gravel is small rocks. You find it on driveways. You find it on roads. Sometimes you find it in your shoe. Why is it in your shoe? No one knows.

I was sitting in my apple barn recently, enjoying a modest lunch that I had persuaded the Old Stone Mill to deliver at no charge — a perfectly reasonable arrangement given my contributions to the community — when Koko leaped onto the windowsill and stared at the driveway with an intensity that made my moustache tingle. He was staring at gravel. Was he trying to tell me something? Of course he was. Koko always is.

Yum Yum, meanwhile, had positioned herself on the gravel path near the bird feeder, which I maintain at considerable personal expense despite the freeloading blue jays who eat far more than their share. I have considered billing the Audubon Society but my accountant says the birdseed is already deductible through the K Fund as a “wildlife habitat maintenance initiative,” which it obviously is.

Speaking of driveways, I noticed Chief Brodie’s squad car pulling up to the Goodwinter farmstead again last Tuesday. That makes the fourth suspicious death on that road this year, which seems about average for Pickax. Is there something in the gravel? Who can say. My moustache was tingling, but I was busy.

It occurs to me that someone has been disturbing the gravel near my back entrance. Are they after Koko? Are they casing the barn? I have asked the K Fund trustees to approve a security camera system, which will also monitor the bird feeder situation.

But back to the subject at hand. Gravel serves many purposes. It provides drainage. It provides traction. It makes a satisfying crunching sound when you walk on it, which Koko finds suspicious every single time. His ears rotate like satellite dishes. Yum Yum ignores it entirely, which is arguably even more profound.

Some people prefer paved driveways. Are those people wrong? Probably. Gravel is natural. Gravel is honest. Gravel asks nothing of you except to be occasionally raked, which I pay someone else to do.

Gravel.