The traffic, as we know, is god-awful, and, because of it you would think there'd be more accidents, but maybe, as a result of the snail's pace, everyone's driving too slowly to inflict much damage. At least that is my hope. I'll check in with the police departments later in the year to see whether my theory held up.
Yes, it's hurry up and relax time here. Honk if you love peace and quiet.
Aside from the beeping and bleeping that clogged arterial roads can generate, I like it when it's lively, as it has been lately in our neighborhood -- when you hear kids exulting, when hip-swiveling music's crossing property lines, and when the tree crickets are at it, as they were as O'en and I walked along the other night. Kids were pummeling a pinata in David Lys's front yard the other evening as he and I approached, and, for a moment, their task was forgotten as they cried, "O'en!" and ran up en masse to pet him.
Yes, it's no longer a dog's life for him anymore. He's living large, adored by children and utterly smitten with Pearl, a lively terrier who lives across the street. Their romps, in Carol's yard and ours, are a joy to watch, especially for us who began to worry that we might not be enough for him.
One wants someone to mix it up with, someone simpatico, someone to enliven summer with . . . and fall, and winter, and spring too.
Are O'en and Pearl our preceptor in that? As our cat, Little Man, was when he showed us how to die, as the slugs were when they languorously made love upon our chimney?
He begins to give us that anticipatory look at around the cocktail hour. It's time, isn't it? It's time, yes, to reunite?
Indeed it is, indeed it is.