As I walked, I kept crossing paths where the grass had been smashed down in a straight line. Evidently, something — or less likely, someone — had made a trail through this area, even I usually think of this grassy extension of my backyard as being deserted. For whatever reason, I followed the trail. I walked for more than an hour in this little universe of green and blue, climbing over rotting trunks and through wet creeks in a Calvin and Hobbes fashion that I remember from when I was a little kid.
Eventually, I came to a little body of water. Not a lake or even a pond, but enough to splash in if I chose to. (I didn't.) It's entirely possible that this pond only existed as a result of all the rain and had never existed quite this way before. I didn't recognize it, but I also can't say that I had ever been in that specific location ever before. A buzzing noise hit my ears and I saw a biplane flying over my head. I looked down and finished watching this antique aircraft in its reflection in the water. I didn't know where I was. I wasn't sure which direction would most quickly take me home. And, as that plane flew over, I wondered how long I'd been gone.
*****
I know haven't written lately. I can't. I just don't have it in me. Words, I guess, are more powerful than I thought, whether they're a blessing or a hex or a simple statement of fact. "Hey. Things aren't the way you think they are." And like that, I feel like the wind's knocked out of me. If you must have a mental image to understand, picture a word balloon from some comic strip. The words are still there, but it's completely deflated and sitting on wet ground.
