evening is a beautiful time

Right now I'm sitting here beside my sliding door, the inside door is open. I can feel the fresh air on my skin. Its not quite twilight. . ahhhh. . love that time when everything cools off, activity wise and temperature wise too - unless you get one of those close, humid nights that annoy rather than soothe. This is one of those green, soothing times. I'm listening to a cacophony of bird calls right now -- can you hear them?! I swear they're that loud! My neighbourhood is of the older, matured tree variety *i.e. many trees are 75 + years old* -- bird 'condos' all over the place here! Do you ever wonder what the birds are saying to each other? I wonder! I love to hear them, except when I have insomnia and its 3:45 a.m. and they're starting up with their little sing songs and i have yet to sleep a wink!!

The twilight comes like God turning the dimmer switch. The sky darkens incrementally, the glow of sunset plays out on the golden red edges of the horizon as purple night softly settles. I love that God did things like this. . really there was no need for him to make it all beautiful, except that's how He is. If he had been inclined to make the daily/nightly switch abrupt, he could have -- imagine blazing sun. . . BAM!!! inky black sky. . blazing heat -- sudden chill. I love that He's so present in every detail of night fall and sunrise and everything in between. He's not abrupt or clumsy. . He's graceful and adept, masterful.

I see the clouds through the screen. . greyish violet, billowing, thick. . Doesn't it look so much like you could grab them? don't they look substantive? Puffs of gas. . majestic and protective, shifting, sheltering. The air smells wet and life giving. It feels dense and pleasingly cool.

The birds are still clucking, and peeping. . but they're quieting. Stillness hangs. . breezeless calm, interrupted only by intermittent traffic noise. Moon and stars have yet to come into view. It won't be long. Have you ever owned a Lite Brite on which you've made pictures with rainbow-coloured plastic pegs over the dark-papered light box? Have you then pulled out all the coloured plastic pegs and looked at the white light glowing through the holy black paper? This is the night sky! Yes? (just different pictures - no clowns or ice cream cones)

I just wandered out bare foot into the yard, the grass feels lush and damp. I padded down the grassy hill, through the gate and stood on the sidewalk. I wanted to get a better look at the sky. As I turned my gaze I was greeted by the beaming full moon. . . Oh, its so gorgeous. What is it that so captures us when we see it? Is it the knowledge of its foreverness on display every night? Its mystique? its membership in 'club universe'? If we explain the light refraction from a ball of gas and fire onto a rocky orb, doesn't sound so lovely. And yes, technically speaking, its precisely that. . but it is lovely and serene. I love the romanticized way we view it.

The birds have ceased. The night has fallen, tucking everything in its big, dark blanket. All is perfectly quiet for a moment, save for the remote, distorted echo of a passing freight train with its mournful, off-key whistle. The corner streetlight's golden halo mesmerizes a frantic cloud of insects. Crickets chirp in harmony. I am quiet, observing, participating. The moon peers through the high branches of the maple tree. I take a draft of night air into my lungs, hold it and exhale slowly. . . ahhhhhhhhh. . .