Published: September 30, 2008 01:09 pm      

Take a trip along the back roads

There’s a beauty to Indiana that one can only appreciate by experiencing it. Further, you won’t notice it while driving 70 miles per hour on one of our four-lane freeways. Instead, you have to travel the back roads, away from the masses of humanity to value the subtleties that make our state unique.

One of our first purchases after moving to Indiana was a county map of the state. It’s boring to drive the same route on every trip and with a county map we discovered some places that the outside world has yet to uncover — places like Wawpecong, Speicherville, Yeddo, Terhune and Anoka. Along the way we discovered some quaint towns, some conversation pieces, several timesaving shortcuts and a few spots that ought to stay hidden. Know what I mean?

A recent discovery includes an out-of-the-way creek that is filled with smallmouth bass. A friend from church called and instead of fishing one of the more popular waterholes where everybody else fishes, we waded down a nearby creek, a creek I have driven past for nearly seven years.

This particular creek isn’t deep enough to float a canoe, but smallmouth bass reside there in abundance. In a little over two hours while wading less than a mile, we caught more than 50 fish. The largest one was 18.5 inches long and weighed three pounds, but we released our catch so they could be caught again, hopefully by us, before you find our spot.

It wasn’t until later that I realized how enjoyable that morning had been. No traffic, no phone, no e-mail, no pager, no iPod, no one knocking at the door and no one asking me to do something I didn’t want to do. Just me, a friend, a cool stream, several snakes and a half-dozen lost lures that somehow ended up in tree branches. And it didn’t cost us a dime (except for replacing the lures).

As fate would have it, I had two hours to kill last Sunday so I headed back to the creek. The fishing was just as good, the weather was absolutely spectacular and for nearly 45 minutes I followed two pairs of eagles down the creek as I methodically fished one small pool of water after another. The only place you can experience that in Indianapolis is the zoo.

In Paul’s first letter to Timothy, he included a paragraph for those who are rich, individuals who might be tempted to trust in their wealth instead of God. That warning includes a reminder that God “provides us with everything for our enjoyment” (1 Timothy 6:17, NIV).

One reality of life that we seldom recognize is that we have everything we need right in our own backyard. We think, however, that there’s nothing to do unless we leave town. With gas costing $4 a gallon, with the stock market in a free fall, with prices escalating beyond our control, isn’t it time to enjoy the benefits of life off the beaten path — and right outside our backdoor?

Tony Thomas is a church pastor, a high school basketball coach and author of "A Smidgeon of Religion." He can be reached through the newspaper at ptnews@pharostribune.com