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Civil Twilight

You have not had anything new here to read because I’ve not posted what I wrote or I’ve not written what I should.  A variety of reasons exist for that, but they are my own.  Here’s something to work out my cobwebs.

But not here.  On richer streets in safer parts of the city lamps konk on and frizzle to life and bath the mown grass in mercury incandescence.  Warm orange kitchen lights square up the near silhouette of cookie-cutter cut homes while the early rabbits hunker near holly bushes afraid to broach the open lawn.  From higher places, places above neatly chimnied rooftops, the last red hope of day drops below the horizon leaving behind a withering orange band.

Day348

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The Trail to Camp-home

A Mid-winter morning grows from grey to bright in the snow spattered mountains.  Where once indistinct shadows fogged the aspen groves now crisp lines stretch miles up the orange-on-white meadow like a sun dial.

Ron was born around here, around this time of year, but coldness never appealed to him the way it did to his older brothers.  After less than a half night’s sleep bedded down in a rock strewn hollow—not as in the lee of the wind as he’d first thought—Ron hustled through the crust throwing plumes of snow-mist from his feet like a rail engine huffing steam.  The sun would rise.  Its warmth would blunt the knife of wind.  And he’d be happy—happier.

Each couple of steps cycled the same thought: his arrival back in Camp-home.  He probably show up from the east near as he could tell.  He would walk through most of Camp-home before locating his mother’s tent.  There would be some surprise at his arrival, but not too much, then one of his brothers, probably Dan because first-born Ton couldn’t appear ruffled, would ask, “Why did you not come by The Trail?”

They would all hang on his answer expecting a polite plausible palatable excuse.  Instead he would answer in the only sensible way he could: “Why would I come by The Trail?”

In a another twenty strides the imaginary memory took the stage of his thoughts once more.  He tried to rewrite the script.  He tried to cobble an answer that wouldn’t keep him separate from his family.  And he did, again, but his feet wouldn’t cooperate, wouldn’t turn toward the west, wouldn’t seek out The Trail.  They kept barging a solitary path through the snow toward Camp-home.

Day 345

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We Need a Balloon

~’We know you have balloons.’~ Lavendar said.

My brain skipped over the implausibility of the conversation I was having with a pixie that had just crawled out of a heating vent near my recliner and latched onto the practical nature of a flying pixie needing a balloon.  Why does God need a starship? “Why do you want a balloon?  Can’t you fly?”

Lemon pounded a small grape Nerd on the hearth trying to crack pixie-bites free of the main Nerd.  She had a pretty good pile going so far.

~’Dumbass.  Why do you want a truck?  Can’t you walk?’~  He stopped on the hill of my guts.

“OK.  What’s it for?  What are you trying to accomplish.”  People asking for help often focus on what they think they need rather than what they are trying to do.

~’We need to get home.’~

“Maybe I could just drive you?”

Lemon made a sound like my watch when I set the time but throatier.  I think Nerds came out of her nose.  Mint was doubled over on my keyboard laughing like a mouse.  Lemon recovered with a pipping cough, ~’Warn a girl next time.’~

“What?  Wouldn’t it be easier to drive you home than to hop on a balloon and hope the wind takes you there?”

The three looked at me like I’d just said the sky was red and the grass was blue.

~’We,’~ Lavendar flitted a circle that included Lemon and Mint, ~’can get home just fine on our own.’~  Then he made a gesture which included me and said, ~’We.  Need a balloon.’~