Late Thursday night…a day wanting to be Friday. Even days have to wait for the passing of time, of long moments and thinking that is wishful.
My old cat is more awake than he has been all day…feeding in the other room. My younger cat…she is likely hidden in plain sight, watching me with her beautiful eyes…the same eyes that prompted me to adopt her from a shelter before I had even stroked her fur or heard her purr. God knows who belongs together…and it takes little or no convincing when it’s right.
I will be awake for a while…in the dog days of summer here in the desert, late afternoon will bring heat near or over a hundred degrees come the dinner hour. And when nature wants to strut her stuff, it will stay nearly as warm till after midnight. I will wait till the cooler time of the tiny hours to open my house to the night, and place fans in doorways and my window above the bed to draw the kinder air into my hamlet beneath the sycamores and desert stars.
Just a few more minutes of my late Momma’s birthday to mark and reflect on her being, her passing, and her being again…in my waking thoughts and very best dreams…
My Dad was very quiet today…I can’t imagine the marking of their anniversary and her birthday one day following the other. He has earned the right to a moment of silence, even if it lasts all day. It’s good too, just to sit with your dad…for the sake of a few days a year, enough has been said for one to know that silence speaks, and sings. And silence recalls, remembers, and celebrates not only what has been…but too what could have been, and what certainly will come at their reunion and the walking away of those two…hand in hand as their two silenced hearts still beat as one.
For now, in the lingered heat of a night late in July, I will consider the cooler hours at hand, the approaching yawn of pale light that is dawn and a day that will soon tire and whither in the heat that will surely bring the eager intentions of many to a place of resignation. And of shade being sought…and quiet reflective laughter at the recollection of bitter cold winter days that were cursed as we lived them…a distant and scorched memory.
Tis a late Thursday night, aspiring to be an early Friday morn, and I will bid adieu to one and embrace the other…as I hear the silence of my thoughtful dad, and strain hard to hear the echoes of laughter from the always near and caring soul of our much missed Mother…
Matthew Lyle Landsman
Matthew Lyle Landsman 