Everything's going my way

All of sudden the sun comes out. I'm out in the back yard to chop some wood. Everything glistening, cool and wet, but the air is crisp and the thick, low clouds run off to the south like strays. Once everyone leaves for school, or work, the mornings settle down. Cardinals, titmice, chickadees, and sparrows flit in the tangled brush while squirrels and chipmunks dash and hop nearby. The unemployed and elderly clean their dishes and get ready to walk their dogs. I hear a buzz-saw -- it's probably someone from the electric co-op trimmin branches on the far side of the lake. But mostly the world is quiet.

Inhale deeply. For the first time in two weeks, my lungs don't ache. Exhale slowly, listen up. Concentration is difficult, attention wanders, that non-stop interior noise interposes itself between the mind and the world. Like my betters before me, I ast myself, what are people for? And, what is the human use of human beings? Once our bellies are full, we tend to get into mischief, busyin our hands in our neighbors' pockets. How many lose faith in work cause they ain't makin money on it?

Shoot, it's so fashionable now to talk about randomness and entropy. Now that the unstoppable March of Progress is in full retreat and the Free Market Boys been forced to trade down to domestic brew. You can make a virtue of simplicity, but you can only fake it for so long. The Young Turks who've been drivin Audis and BMWs, you think they're gonna be happy toolin around in a Ford Focus?

I hear a someone whistlin "Oh What a Beautiful Morning" over on the next street. Might be Sweet Lou, but I haven't seen him in a couple of weeks, ever since he went in for those tests. Last time I saw him, he said, "Good morning, John. When you get to be my age, every morning is a good one."

But the morning don't last. The clouds come scuttlin back overhead, the sun is lookin to hide from the rain that's forecast, and the traffic picks up on Lakeshore as people head out to go shopping. I bury my axe deep into the stump I use as a chopping block and look skyward. A big plane banks lazily on its way down to Newark. There's a lot of motion goin on everywhere. I mutter under my breath, be still, poot. You've got a lot of work to do right here, before you start travelin again.