Tag: anticipation

Post #335

From the AMTRAK: Emergency Brake. Open this cover. Alarm will sound. Pull handle down.

I started writing something earlier today. And it was hard. Hard to think about and hard to write about. But, at least to me, worth writing about.

Frankly, it required more nuance than I had to give to it today. I have decided that I’m going to defer this post for a little bit. I still want to write it, but it deserves a bit more research and thoughtful thinkings and a better articulation.

You might be surprised that I do that, Loyal Reader. Surprised that this publication includes research and thinking and rifling through options and analysis and then writing. I realize that much of what you read here may seem like a simple stream of consciousness. And if I were to tell the truth, which is my preference since I am lazy and lying takes a lot of work, I would admit to at least my share, if not more than my share, of raw and emotive work. Even these, though, take some cognitive and creative effort. I’m not kidding.

That said, there are many posts that I wrestle with deeply. Posts that I start with gusto but then lose steam. Sometimes the energy is gone after a paragraph or two. Other times it is writing that simply doesn’t coalesce. It might have concepts or sentences that are brilliant, but it either doesn’t hang together with the rest of the words or just doesn’t have enough form to be cogent. While that may also surprise you, Loyal Reader, that is that I hold back when something sucks, it’s just a confession about how bad my writing can be.

In this case, though, I have something that I want to say and I want to say it to you, Loyal Reader. But first, I need to make sure that it will stand up on it’s own and that, second, if you object to my thesis, you will at least have enough to object to. I don’t want to leave you unsatisfied, or worse, dismissive. Truly your indifference is the most painful.

So, for today, I will only share with you a little about my process and a hint of something yet to come.

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Trickle Down Effect

Here is a pic I took of a garden statute in someone's yard as we were taking too long a walk on too hot a morn.

Drip. Drip. Drip. But not fast. Very slow.

Well, the first drip is slow. It creeps along the bridge ever so reluctantly. You almost feel it, but then you don’t. You’re not sure until it’s about two-thirds the way down. Then it snowballs a bit. That’s kind of funny because snow is the opposite of what you’re experiencing.

As the saline solution reaches the end of the bridge, at the tip, you feel it accumulating. It isn’t really heavy, in a way that it creates pressure. It’s more like a swelling. It is amassing. Gaining enough mass where you can begin to see it if you almost cross your eyes. It is becoming a drop. A bead of sweat. That will drip. Right off of your nose. And you’re not working out. You’re just going about your business.

It’s 91°F and the humidity is 60%. This calculates to what is called a Heat Index of 102°F. The other phrase for Heat Index is Feels Like. In this case it feels like it is too hot and your body is leaking.

The water is almost hanging from your nose. It feels like that minute as the Olympic divers stand on the edge of the platform, facing away from the water and just before they hurtle themselves in the air in twists, turns, pikes and tucks to meet the water. Their hands are clasped together as in prayer, but they use this spear to slice into the water for a splash free entry.

But you? Your hands are no help. They’re otherwise occupied. You’re hand deep in dirt, or you have two hands on the leash, or you’re carrying two bags of groceries and a twelve pack. You can’t brush the water away, even though it is annoying you. You both don’t want it to drip and can’t wait for it to release. You won’t shake your head to get rid of it.

Turns out you are now waiting for it. It’s an uncomfortable, yet delicious, anticipation. You stand still because you know it’s so close. So ready. You lean your head a bit away from your body and watch the pearl fall.

You lose sight before it hits the ground, but the next bubble is already beginning its slide. You brush this one away, either using the back of your hand or at your shoulder. But it doesn’t matter. The drips are backed up like O’Hare after a wind shear. They will come one after another now.

Your hands are still occupied, but you somehow reach for the key to step into the dark, cool house where you will splash your face with many many many drops of cool, salt free, water and dry yourself off. A sigh of relief will slip from your lips. You shake your head.

Posted on by docthink 0

Summer Is Coming

Dear lord, can't you smell the honeysuckle?!

We have been devoid of Spring. It has not come. It has forsaken us.

Now, it is late May, the trees are in full leaf. As if we had had Spring. But we did not.

Spring comes in small signs and then big gestures. And we have not had that progression. No. We have not.

It is supposed to be portended by the sharp points of the crocus leaves that deliver purple and white blooms in late January or early February and followed immediately by the yellow stars of the forsythia. These flowers bring joy when they disdain the snow and show themselves through the icy crystals. This did not happen.

Instead we had all of the flowers, the crocus, the forsythia, the cherries, the tulips, the daffodils and, even, the iris present themselves all at once and out of order at once. The buds were baffled by the long, rainy and mostly cold time during and after winter, inclusive of the time that we would call Spring.

There have been only four days this month without rain. I didn’t believe it either. I counted. Row by row I counted. And I remembered each cold damp day this month. And unlike any other May that I have seen in Washington, D.C., the temperature did not meet 80°F until yesterday. No. It did not.

There are only five days until the official beginning of summer; Memorial Day when you can fashionably wear white shoes–as if you would, but at least you could.

So tonite as I strolled up and down the street, with The Beast mostly in tow (yes, he tried to tow me, but I was having none of it), I was restored.

I had retrieved him from his hut and swapped my shoes from the sling backs to the sneakers. That damn dog has pulled me out of many a sling back, I tell you.

I didn’t grab an umbrella or don a raincoat or even snuggle into a hoodie for that matter because the night was unusually, albeit appropriate to the calendar, warm. As we ambled, the air was without bite, the hairs on my arms were not called to warm. And then. And then. And then.

There was the perfume of the honeysuckle that filled the entire block, maybe the entire street and perhaps, even, the entire city. It was that big. It was spicy, and sweet and actually radiated warmth, not just in my nose, but on my cheeks and on my forehead and on the exposed backs of my hands and on my knees and my ankles.

It was all of Spring, all that we missed for the past ten weeks, undiluted and concentrated in this fraction of an hour. It was so redolent and so encompassing that I feel that Spring was not stolen from me this year. It just arrived. All at once, in one breath. Yes, it did.

Posted on by docthink 0