Sweet and Crisp

I fell asleep at 8PM and woke up in a flash at 2:45.

In honor of the nail polish kids and Bill's new eyesight, I bought maroon lipstick for my fingers at Job Lot and painted them. I bought green purple shimmer, green, and black too. The sign said 30 percent off the one dollar marked! "It's expensive not to buy it" I say when I see a bargain. I loved nail polish when I was a kid and had to hide my fingers whenever I used it. I still wince and apologize. "You look like a streetwalker, a whore" my grandfather would say. Lipstick and nail polish is not for girls! Yesterday we got a flu shot from a thick needle from a sweet gal with eyelashes longer than Bambi. "They're real" she said about her lashes. "Everyone asks me" My brother has them too!" A little pain now is better than the flu. It could kill me with asthma, I could drown in my bed on the third floor. So I get the shot every September. "My husband brings home the germs" I say, "He teaches at a school" then we drove to the big apple orchard in the sunshine, and got half a bushel of Macouns and a box of yellow peach seconds, and began nibbling on the way home. The apples were so spicy and sweet and crisp and the peaches were juicy.

I took a nap. I heard classical music but it is inside my head It is really the fan humming replaying the music I've heard on the radio all day. When I got to my desk at three AM I heard words inside my head but it is really the words I've heard spoken all day.

Pretty soon it will be too hard to get up at three AM but for now it is the best way to live and I cherish the open space. At these times words flow in the darkest hour. Once November hits it will be too cold in the house and I will be too sad to face the day a moment earlier than necessary and I will try to stay awake as late as possible watching television hoping to lift off from my gloom. I'll greet the morning at 8AM with dread and walk for miles to clear my head. I will paint pictures in the afternoon. I hate the holidays. I can't choose where I'll be but I can learn to appreciate the ride. Learn to love the intervals. The day and the night the sun and the rain, the pauses for breath, between the words.

Sunny Sunday pumpkin waffles and a walk to the peach tree. All of Great Grandpa French's peaches are touching the ground due to a few broken branches. I climb the hill and sneak one and have an asthmatic coughing fit, from the pollen. Today I will ask him about the abandoned peaches touching the ground. Ginger-peach-jam anyone? Billy at the mashed potato house is French's grandson and Spud the min-pin tater-tot is his great grand dog.