Morning

The cat leaves her window sill perch, her nose parting the drapes, and drops to the desk where she sits for a moment, yawning. Her arrival indicates that she has had enough of watching the night turn pale, and she is ready for sleep. If I don't make down the bed within a few minutes, she will begin to nag. The cat is the one who makes me go to bed. If not for her, I would lose track of time and never get to sleep before full dawn.

The silence of the unawakened street is broken by the car which brings the newspaper. As it turns in the driveway, its headlights flash across the drapes. When I go out to fetch the paper, the flowers have regained the color lost by night, and birds are beginning to chirp. I don't read the headlines. One does not read such things before sleep. I want the purring of cats and the song of birds in my dreams, and the bursting buds and rustling leaves, not the doings of men.

Long Evening

I woke with a cat licking my hair. Presumably, she had finished cleaning her ass and still had some spit left. Now I have an itchy red welt on my head, right behind my ear. Cat allergy.

The kid on the corner has a go-kart, which he is riding up and down the block in the balmy evening. Thus far, he has failed to injure or kill anyone with it, nor have the police arrested him for illegally operating a motor vehicle (he's thirteen.) I'm beginning to think that he and I are the only people on the block who aren't deaf. If he keeps riding the thing, he soon will be. I really need to get those new headphones.

Another storm is expected over the weekend, but for now the weather is quite splendidly spring-like. The insects have returned. Bees spent the afternoon buzzing around the profusion of purple blossoms which have sprung from the sourgrass, and about half of the reedy stalks of the lily plants are flaunting crumply white blossoms. And, of course, the mulberry tree is again emitting smoke-like puffs of pollen.

To my surprise, a bevy of quail entered the back yard to feed, this afternoon. Before the cats moved in, quail were a daily sight here throughout the spring. Now that the aging felines are spending most of each day napping indoors, I suppose it is safe for the quail to return. Still, I hope they exercise caution, particularly once they have chicks. The four I saw today were all adults. Both cats and hawks can make short work of baby quail, and I've seen both stray cats and a few hawks about the neighborhood recently.

The long evening is nice, in spite of the mechanized racket. In a few weeks the lingering spring twilight will be scented with the perfume of night blooming jasmine. It will be time for making iced tea again, and sipping it under the rustling young leaves of the mulberry tree as the light fades in the west and the crickets chirp in the bushes. Those are the best evenings of the year.