Perfection...More or Less

Friday, April 19, 2024

What Lies Within Us

Type, backspace, type, backspace, type, backspace… I might as well go back to bed at this rate. It’s come to my attention, by me, that I lack that vibrance that sets me apart from six feet under.

I’m sitting at the deck table after toting the laptop, laptop stand, mouse, foam support with the keyboard, three cushions (Falling backwards and landing on my tailbone – don’t ask 😒), foot stool, reading glasses, one glass of ice water, and cellphone, in case I take a spill, haha.

I’m not looking forward to the hour when I wrap it all up, the hour just before the cockroaches under the deck start eyeing the sliding screen door’s sliver of space as the entrance into Yvonne’s inner sanctum.

I’ve grown accustom to these little creatures that bring dread to this being when spied - not outside, but inside.

There seems to be plenty of examples lately:

(1) a cockroach in my kitchen, caught in the act as I flipped on the light switch - drats! Disappeared, but next morning it appeared to have been a cat toy and was begging for a toilet flush right out of existance.

(2) opened the knife drawer and both I and that dance-all-over-the-silverware bugger were completely surprised.

(3) the one upside down in the bathtub taking a siesta was easy-peasy to take down.

(4) climbing into bed with calming music, and a cockroach on the ceiling over my head enjoying the peacefulness of my bedtime routine.

Let’s just say I’m not a fan of living with tiny things that know no boundaries.

Wow! That’s quite a mouthful of things. I hope you didn’t nod off for a quick snooze. I was going to just say things that know no boundaries, but I live with cats 😏, need I say more.

Anyway… back to my dilemma. I’m so afraid of falling down, and for good reason; I seem to have made the four walls of my adobe my prison, and the garden the prison yard. I so need to change this, but to what?

Okay… change of scenery to this very moment as a frog is croaking loudly by the dogwood tree that was watered earlier in the day due to temperatures in the 80’s F and no rain for a while. I may hear it, but finding it seems to be impossible this day.

Wind is picking up, lifting the canopy above me, jerking the umbrella back and forth as it announces the weather is changing, with rain in the forecast by morning. We shall see.

A carpet of last year’s leaves and a handful of freshly plucked weeds from the deck pot of common sage are at my feet as I step out from under the umbrella to view the sky. It’s the temptation every gardener has when they view work that has not yet been done. I just couldn’t help myself when I hit a lull in my writing. A bit of dirt under the nails never hurts any writer.

Last summer my husband saw two opossums, each one on a different segment of the road through the subdivision to our home, hit by a car. We had no more visits to our feeder, so we assumed they probably were our regular visitors.

We were pleasantly surprised to find near the end of April this year, another opossum has found our feeder. Isn’t it funny how a little thing as simple as this can make someone so very happy.

Vic has brought dinner from Arby’s, as we aren’t too hungry; then the birdbaths and feeder will be refreshed. A little red wagon would sure come in handy to cart all this paraphernalia and bric-a-brac back inside to my writing room… the room where thoughts are rarely put to print.

From this little bird who feels like she’s living in a cage tweeting away; life is just days, weeks, months and years slipping away; so I guess Mr. Emerson said it best.

“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.”

Love You.