She Moves Slowly, She Is Beautiful

It is that moment in spring where everything is at its fullest. Like a nine and a half months pregnant woman, she is ready to give birth to summer. I know, I know, we just had the solstice, but Florida is not Connecticut. Florida is not Colorado. Florida is not even the Florida you might think of, here where I live.
We have our seasons, we truly do, but they are compacted and pressed and planned to make the most time for our sweltering summers which can claw at your throat with their unrelenting humidity and heat for what seems an eternity and so we are incredibly grateful for this season of blossoming and mild temperatures where we can actually go outside and work in the yard without fearing heatstroke and mosquitoes.
We are in that sweet lull before all of that comes hammering down on our heads and the petals of the dogwoods fly through the air and drift to the ground and I feel as if I need an army of brides to come and stroll around my yard to be showered by their pure whiteness.

Last night on the way home from rehearsal, I believe I may have wiped out an entire generation of frogs. Oh, lord, but I hate that. There is no human way to avoid them on the highway. The lights of the car show them silhouetted on the road in front of you, one after another after another and there is not enough swerving and swaying to avoid them, their slick bodies on the slick pavement as they try to cross the road and why? Not to fuck a chicken, I'll tell you that. No, I suppose that even for frogs the grass is sweeter on the other side, or perhaps the sweethearts are sweeter on the other side or the pond fuller of potential dates. It's like being on Tennessee Street on a Friday night, watching the college kids cross the busy highway to get from one bar to another, risking life and limb for the potential of cheaper beer, prettier girls, a better time. I drove down the road saying, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," a mantra of apology that did no good whatsoever.

And it's supposed to rain more today and then tomorrow and if the predictions are correct and we have strong winds and rain and perhaps hail and the threat of tornadoes tomorrow morning I will not be sitting on Monroe Street waving to our preternaturally tanned governor as he goes by in a convertible in the Springtime Tallahassee Parade. No, I will be sitting on Old Lloyd Road in a chair on my porch, sipping my coffee and watching the winds toss those dogwood blossoms around. Mr. Moon is going out of town and I will have the weekend and house and dogs to myself. I plan on eating what I want (although I have no idea what this might be) and working in the yard if weather permits and writing in my office and perhaps doing a little hallway dancing if the spirit should move me. I need some dervish worship, some flinging of myself about in space to music. Bruce? Bob? Those chicks from Dixie? We shall see. One never knows.

And so this is Friday. A damp, froggy day in North Florida, gray and still. At least here in Lloyd. The magnolia leaves are wiggling their own stiff, glossy dance in the breeze and it's a breeze that seems to promise more serious action. I can hear it in the new leaves of the Bradford Pears. It sounds exactly like swishing silk.

I have to go to town to run errands and that will be fine but I'll tell you this: I'll be so glad to come home again. Spring is coming to an end and I do not want to miss a second of it. Not one rain drop, not one falling petal, not one wet weeding session under the tea olives where the dripping rain carries the molecules of their sweet scent to my nose so intensely that I am in danger of swooning right there in the dirt, my weeder in my hand, my heart as happy as it can be.