Aromatic

Thunder filled the afternoon, but only a few brief showers fell. The lawn will not be turning green, but for a few hours the air carried that unique scent made of dry grass and rain-damp soil. Hose water can't create it, but only late summer rain. Hose water smells of pipes, but rain smells of sky. It was a nice looking sky to smell of, too, first all tumbling gray masses, then swaths of blue butting white thunderheads, and then spilling sunlight down to the wet trees, making them glitter. I don't suppose I'll see that again for a while. Tomorrow it's back to baked earth and the smell of heated pines, and probably smoke from mountain wildfires. It was nice while it lasted.

( Sunday Verse )

Missed

There's a faint hint of smoke in the air again tonight, but now it smells just a bit of sandalwood. I envision a coven of witches in a nearby wood burning incense as part of some ritual. Perhaps entrails are being read at this very moment. If so, I do hope they predict a mild and pleasant unraveling of the summer and a mild and pleasant autumn to follow. No wildfires, please, and a good crop of pumpkins for pies and jack-o-lanterns.

August is finally approaching its final day, and my only regret is that I totally forgot about the Perseid meteor shower. It would have been a good year to see it since there was no moonlight during the peak nights. I think I forgot it because it came during the week my telephone service went bad, and I wasn't getting much Internet time so and was very distracted. Now there probably won't be another decent shower until the Leonids in November. That will be some cold watching, even assuming that the sky here won't be overcast or stormy.

Oh, the lateness of the hour.