A Week Later

Eliminate one sense and the others become heightened.

Walk in the dark after days and days of heavy rain and you cannot see much. Pay just enough attention to the ground so that you don't trip or slip and hurt yourself - you are not immortal anymore and an injury would be painful and very inconvenient. The moon is gone and the clouds overhead keep the warmth in the evening air so that it does not bite your nose or lungs as it did a few weeks ago. You realize that the air does not smell like cars or people or animals. It is fragrant, though. There is the heavy sweetness of mock orange, and high tones of early blooming bulbs like narcissus and hyacinth, possibly cherry blossoms. Although you cannot see these things in the dark, you imagine they are nearby. The scents that cannot be identified get parsed in the mind for future reference. Is that the sharp and pungent oil of native California sage? How can that be if the only other time you've identified it was on a dry warm day? Maybe you smell the fresh green of dandelions and grass and tender flowers.

It has been raining, very heavily at times, for over two weeks. But the earth is warming up, and it is no longer cold and sleeping. Time to take more blind walks.