Rope

Today the sun was out and Lily and I walked to Precious Blood Cemetery. When we got there I saw a bunch of cars lined up near a gravesite at the north side. There were people wearing long black coats gathered around a wooden coffin covered in colorful flowers. Lily and I stayed out of sight, walking west, up the hill. Then we stepped out of the cemetery onto the road. I could see that the reservoir was still frozen and the ice was gray but there were big areas of black ice. I noticed a big maple tree looked decorated. When I looked up close, I could see that it had dark red buds all over its branches. I even heard a few spring bird songs while we walked. We went to the park and Lily ran wild in the baseball field. I looked down and spotted a red white and green knotted rope frozen into the ice - I'll bet it was a Christmas dog toy! I yanked it free from the ground and threw it for Lily a few times. She loved chasing it and running with it in her mouth as if it were her very own dead squirrel! She used to have a rope toy like this but she shredded it. I decided to take the rope toy home. On the way back we passed by the cemetery and I saw that all the people who had been wearing black coats had left, and the two grave-diggers in dayglow orange vests were maneuvering the heavy gray cement box, positioning it with their little yellow tractor. The box was held by chains from a big metal hook, suspended over a hole. When we arrived home I washed Lily's new toy in a bucket of warm soapy water in the kitchen sink. I hung it on the clothesline in the boiler room to dry.