Last night it rained. It poured. I slept soundly but I know it rained because this morning the sounds of dripping, like the steady tick tock of a clock, echo throughout the gardens. And raindrops glisten everywhere even tho' there is no sun. It's wet. It's hot. This giant tea kettle I sometimes call paradise produces steam and I am the tea bag - the flow-through kind. But I don't mind. I have no a/c in the house so 'tis better to be here, in the gardens, steeping. Is it not?
The colors of the gardens are intoxicating, inebriating. For a minute I stop steeping and drink the colors in with my eyes. Do I also feel them, taste them, smell them, hear them? I think so, yet I am intoxicated, inebriated - drunk and overwhelmed with colors, hues, pigments as I walk into the canvas and become part of the painting itself. What color am I?
My feet are wet. I should have worn the garden clogs, not the flip-flops. I don't call them thongs anymore. Thongs refer to underwear now. I wear underwear. I don't wear thongs. Maybe I will wear thongs again when I am in my second childhood, stopped forever in my mind at age 20-something. My flip-flops and feet are wet. Passing leaves reach out and slap me with raindrops. My legs are wet. I'm steeping (or am I steaming)?
Anyway, I travel on. I'm supposed to be taking a walk. I'm getting fat. I need to walk. I walk and talk to myself in my mind. (At least I think that's myself who both talks and listens). Walk or be fat? Walk or be fat? My mantra. Hmmm, tough choice. Can't decide. A bird that sounds like a child's squeak-toy when stepped on starts making his/her noise. I don't call it singing. I call it annoying - distrubing my peace. I don't know where he/she is. I'd like to know what kind of bird pretends to be a child's squeak-toy. I have a list of things to do when I retire and I mentally add "figure out what sound belongs to what bird" to it.
I feel eyes upon me. I always think there is some animal or maybe a big foot creature hiding in the trees bordering the field next door brewing up a plot to get me someday when I am alone. I love nature, but sometimes nature scares me. Or do I scare myself? Those imaginary creatures of my mind brew plots, I steep, I'm hot. I walk. Do they creep and follow me? Is this paranoia? My mind is infused with all sorts of thoughts.
Tiny eyes upon me, mosquitoes biting me. I play Goliath and the bugs are David. Or am I a giant Peeping Tom, peering, peeking, seeking fairies or Thumbelina? No, I see bugs. Beetles, spiders, caterpillars, slugs, creepy-crawlies - I call them all bugs. It would be better to say insects, I suppose. I don't know the proper differences that distinguish them all. But I don't care so I'm not adding that to my retirement list. I don't like bugs. But I continue to steep and peep, shoot and snap.
Something is bugging me.
