Watching

The approaching storm has provided us with a splendid day. The sky is mostly cloudy, but the sun breaks through now and then to brighten the turning leaves that dance in the stiff breezes. The sky is not yet the uniform gray that is likely to prevail once the rain arrives, but richly variegated, with darker and lighter banks of thick clouds, patches of thin clouds that reveal a dimmed sun, and clusters of small clouds that rush along with the blue sky beyond them.

Once in a while the edges of some cloud bank will blaze out white as a nearby open area allows the full sunlight to reach it. All the time the fluttering leaves are singing, and the swift air smells of pine and the nearing rain that soon will fall. Birds are singing ecstatically. They sound as delighted as I feel.

I'm going back outside now to watch it some more.

Almost

When I was outside fetching the mail a few minutes ago there was a brief sprinkle, but apparently that was only a stray shower and not the onset of the storm. I expect it will be raining before midnight, though, and that everything will be thoroughly soaked by the time I get up tomorrow. Right now I have a very strong craving for ice cream. Maybe I've had an unconscious premonition that the power will go out and the ice cream in the freezer will melt and be ruined. There's lots of other stuff in the freezer, so I don't know why I don't have a craving for any of those things. I'm going to eat ice cream anyway, and just hope that the burritos and tamales and taquitos and fish sticks and shrimp scampi and such will survive the storm.