What I'll Miss If I'm Gone

THE DANCING TREES

This town is not a bad place. The other morning I tossed Maggie up in her backpack carrier and strode through the fog that had settled in this valley, hungry for black & white photographs of trees in fog. I found two trees dancing - a day later their leaves had burst out into little green flags.

At night I walk Dylan down Market Street where the shop windows are lit. At this time of year the town's smell reminds me faintly of New York: exhaust, food, smoke and concrete. On Friday night, the college girls on the sidewalk smell like flowers. Their faces are anxious like nervous fawns. The boys drive past in muddy open-top jeeps and toss city music out like seeds in this small rural town.



I like to look in the windows of the historic hotel where stodgy people wearing the clothes of their children's generation enjoy their animated conversation over dinner. I always look at the displayed paintings of the local artist - I like to see the large one of two green chairs against a white fence. When I turn down our street, I always watch the stars as they drape themselves over the oldish two-story houses. Many of these houses have real chimneys and real shutters - which I find deeply nourishing.



Tonight while Lyric and I picniced in our back yard, the man two houses down sat on his lawn and played a lively guitar he had "just strung up" after getting it out of storage. He sang his licks like he meant them and tapped his black leather penny loafer to keep time with his softened fingertips. He said he was rusty.