hiding

Like the sweet william, buried in the blackberry branches, dwarfed by tiger lilies, I am hiding. On the porch at Ed’s farmette, with stacks of exams at the side.






I have three distractions (or excuses, if you will) to stop working.

One – I occasionally get up and offer help with some excruciatingly back breaking task that Ed might be doing. Like watering the tomato plants, or carting heavy items to the nearly fallen barn so that he can free up space in the storage shack (garage?) for his little boat.

Another – I am, as always, drawn to watch the work of the truck farmers on the adjacent land.





The day is hot and they work relentlessly and I can only be happy for them that the mosquitoes have not (yet) arrived.



Which brings me to point three: there are a lot of ants and flies in this world and although I have a outdoor person’s reasonably high tolerance for both, I also have the instinctive gesture of flicking them away when they come too close. And this makes me wonder – what would it be like to be like Ed, or like my grandpa, completely indifferent to the presence of, say, a dozen large ants around me, over me, below me?

There is a sky-high mountain of ants by the old farmhouse and, sensing a cleaner space inside these days (I’m guessing this), the ants have chosen to expand their ramblings and come indoors. I wish I could say – welcome! You and I can coexist! Pardon me, while I move the chair around you. But I can’t. I look up and see ants -- I want to redirect them to other places.

So, as you can see -- not many distractions. And that is a good thing.


Except at the end of the day. Larry, the troubled cat (whom I love because, being troubled, he prefers a quick pat to a climb over my computer and into my lap -- are you listening, Isis??) is sprawled next to the sling chair, Ed brings out to the porch the one wine glass in the sheep shed... That's it then. Until tomorrow, when I will attack the next dozen exams.