The only other person in the bed woke up to go to the bathroom.
So the pup woke up. And had to go outside to pee.
So I woke up.
The other person went back to sleep.
The pup went back to sleep.
The old old dog went back to sleep.
The four cats somehow, despite their irritation at being so unjustly disturbed, went back to sleep.
I lay there...waiting....to go back to sleep.
And did finally realize that was not in the cards this early morning. And thus, in the cool summer darkness, I quietly got up, grabbed some clothes, and slipped out of the bedroom. To be followed closely by a squinty eyed, stumbling 4 month old canine, who is a Shepherd, so does innately follow you anywhere you go, and then, as his Mama and Papa probably taught him, sits carefully upon your feet to await further events.
Giving his hungry belly a perfunctory meal, we left the house, sidled the car up the driveway to leave in slumber the bedroom's crowd, and the slumbering neighbor who rents the cottage, imagining her cat, her kid,and herself, fast fast asleep as the sun slowly made itself known.
Off we went, down the road by the range, down the hills, and entered the flatter lands by the first set of fields, where the sky did glow with morning light, in the midst of such thick fog.
All was quiet at the river, save the cacophony of the skies, brilliant, changing every second, so you kept your eye on the river and all overhead, so unbelievable, while so much of the neighborhood slept, not a car sound, not a door opening, not a person wandering, all the neighborhood chicken coops closed still.
Down the dew soaked path we wandered, as the earth did slowly turn, and the light came through the fog a bit more each moment, the birds gradually heard to be singing good-morning to the day and each other, the insects all wet and dewy, awaiting the sun's heat to dry their limbs and wings, and go about their lives.
In my neighborhood, like yours, wherever you do live, the plants have an order in which they come out and flourish and blossom, come to seed, or proliferate small plantlets, and then become more dormant, or die back until another season.
As you walk down the places in your neighborhood, day after day, year after year, you learn who your neighbors are. The plants. The trees. the two and four footeds living there. You begin to realize that humans are actually NOT the only ones. To live. To have neighborhoods. To matter.
In fact, if you listen and observe around you, or read, you realize that what you always felt inside was true- you as a small one could understand speech long before you could speak it. What you experienced was important, even if those around you forgot this. Somehow you knew that you were not alone. That the tree by your side responded to you as you responded to it. The insects smelled you and the wild creatures heard your breath inside your home as you slept as a small child, as they quietly slipped by.
One of my neighbors is an enormous toad in the garden, who snuggled into a small seedling container in the midst of all my seedling containers, pushed the dirt aside, and laid her eggs... She is an elder, in fact, toooo big for the neighborhood snakes to gobble up. And now, in the same place, are so many tiny baby toads, all with beautiful brand new bumpy bodies, scampering around, the 50 seedling six packs their nursery, as they grow older and come into the world.
The pup and I slowly wander down the Adele Dawson Conservation path by the Connecticut, not a person in sight, as the hawk parents begin to nestle and feed their young.
As the beaver down in the water swimmingly wanders along choosing a breakfast.
As a pair of ducks go tail up, munching down quietly on their on meal of a few of the thousand small fishes that are splittering the tops of the river's waters with their small hungry morning mouths.
As some of them make it down down to the farther reaches of the river, possbily even the sea.
Imagine traveling to the sea, in a river, carried by the current, as you grew up.
I think that's kind of what being a human adolescent is like, everything around you and inside of you and you changing and changing so fast, as you try to get acclimated to where your body is TODAY and how on earth to manage.
My feet are slick with dew, his black fuzzy enormous paws soaked happily, as we wander along. As the light of day approaches.
Taking note of smells
of the emergence of the rioting wild Phlox, and the accompanying
celebration of all kinds of winged and non winged insects,
the wind picking up a bit, the light coming finally.
We turn at the end, and begin to make our way back to the car, the hundreds of slumbering wild Tiger Lilies slowly taking note of the sun's light, feeling the small heat upon their blossoms, and opening their blossoms slowly, slowly waking up.
On the way home, still early, there are ever changing skies, that shift and shift and shift. Best view in the house. The wind is picking up.
We decide to stop by the Summit House at the tip top of The Mount Holyoke Range, to check out these strange clouds, this increasingly wild wind that has come upon the land.
The birds are all talking about it in an unusual fashion.....
Up the road, the young summer Rangers come running out to the car, saying there is a Tornado warning, and they are shutting the road down. Sounds right to me, those weird formations whirling around just a bit too fast to be usual.
On the way down, we pass car after car, scooting up the road...I wave, they slow down, and they are all filled with excited young adults of every flavor you could imagine. Wonderful! I tell them the bad news.
No standing at the very top of the range, getting the birds eye view of the valley, as some weird strange fast moving fast talking clouds race on in. Their disappointment is palpable.
I don't know if they'll make a run for it, or if those adept young rangers will stop each and every one. Oh shucks. And then, slowly, the wind comes sweeping in, carrying away the foment of directions and altitudes and formations and swirlygigs far up into the skies...and it all dissipates like magic!
By the time we get home and stroll into the back yard, there is only a spectacular weather front remaining, stark against the mid day skies.
One lovely Lupine, gone to seed, having had its rash bounty of Cerulean blossoms, a chorus sent across the lands, watching the wildness recede.
Its hard, furred pods holding the promise of tomorrows, of weathers and small new plantlets and lives,
when we are long gone, and all that swirls round the earth remains in this place,
world without end, Amen
Below
the damp cloud cover
Striking
fragrant Tansy stands tall, overseeing
The
vibrant blue swallows sweep the land while enormous
old fish leap, splash, and disappear,
