Day in the Life: The Long Ride Home
Lightning.
Inside clouds in the distance, the near distance, the distance I'm going to reach soon. Tonight it looks menacing. Mean, like a gangster firing into the air, threatening me, knowing that I'll soon be in range.
Flash, flash, the clouds become real and thick and translucent. The motorcycle beneath me speeds closer to the exploding clouds. It whines and shakes against the wind and the few drops of rain that seem to hang in the air until my faces bursts them.
Flash. The clouds are closer, larger, the wind faster and denser. The drops start to sting. I duck behind the helmet of my driver to avoid the fast, stinging drops. He swerves around a mud-filled pothole. I remember why I have to watch the road.
Both of us, the driver and I, are huddled against the thick wind and stinging drops, shaken by every flash of the lightning, which is now like a flourescent overhead light struggling to stay on. My face, I realize, is a grimace. I try to relax it. But I feel like a grimace.
The whine of the motorcycle spikes as we push up a short dark hill. The drops in the sky feel heavy as the bike slows. And getting heavier.
A single bare incandescent light burns under an overhang that advertises a mobile phone service carrier. I point and say "First stop here" because the driver will understand if I talk like that. He pulls the bike into the deepening mud at the roadside and we push ourselves against the wall of the building.
Flash. The drops are growing and quickening, slanting through the air and exploding on the road. Like a crowd in a stadium their roar grows and grows, but it doesn't diminish. There is not rest to breathe, no end of the building emotion. Louder and louder. The mud thickens.
I pace. Tired. Cold for the first time in months. Near enough to home that I would keep going if not for the expensive camera in my backpack. My camera has me pinned to a wall.
So I wait.
Finally the emotion begins to level, and then to fade. The slanting drops sigh and become thin, their anger or enthusiasm spent and fulfilled. Soon their noise is like a hush, the silence around the drops as loud as the drops themselves.
We leave. The driver and I. Through the mud.
Inside clouds in the distance, the near distance, the distance I'm going to reach soon. Tonight it looks menacing. Mean, like a gangster firing into the air, threatening me, knowing that I'll soon be in range.
Flash, flash, the clouds become real and thick and translucent. The motorcycle beneath me speeds closer to the exploding clouds. It whines and shakes against the wind and the few drops of rain that seem to hang in the air until my faces bursts them.
Flash. The clouds are closer, larger, the wind faster and denser. The drops start to sting. I duck behind the helmet of my driver to avoid the fast, stinging drops. He swerves around a mud-filled pothole. I remember why I have to watch the road.
Both of us, the driver and I, are huddled against the thick wind and stinging drops, shaken by every flash of the lightning, which is now like a flourescent overhead light struggling to stay on. My face, I realize, is a grimace. I try to relax it. But I feel like a grimace.
The whine of the motorcycle spikes as we push up a short dark hill. The drops in the sky feel heavy as the bike slows. And getting heavier.
A single bare incandescent light burns under an overhang that advertises a mobile phone service carrier. I point and say "First stop here" because the driver will understand if I talk like that. He pulls the bike into the deepening mud at the roadside and we push ourselves against the wall of the building.
Flash. The drops are growing and quickening, slanting through the air and exploding on the road. Like a crowd in a stadium their roar grows and grows, but it doesn't diminish. There is not rest to breathe, no end of the building emotion. Louder and louder. The mud thickens.
I pace. Tired. Cold for the first time in months. Near enough to home that I would keep going if not for the expensive camera in my backpack. My camera has me pinned to a wall.
So I wait.
Finally the emotion begins to level, and then to fade. The slanting drops sigh and become thin, their anger or enthusiasm spent and fulfilled. Soon their noise is like a hush, the silence around the drops as loud as the drops themselves.
We leave. The driver and I. Through the mud.
posted by James at 08:05
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1 Comments:
James,
I marvel as I scroll through your brilliant posts and see those sad words " no comments yet" . Perhaps we are all too intimidated to pull out our puny words in the face of yours. There are lots of singers I would not want to follow onstage.
I personally found those words so discouraging that I lost that initial blush of enthusiasm for writing for this format. At least when I play my guitar somebody sings along. Writing without being able to detect an audience - shouting out to the world and not even hearing the bounce of a distant echo- that is not for the faint of heart! I am glad YOU have not grown faint or weary of this well-doing.Keep it up-please! there will be a rich harvest.
Admiring while as the same time trying not to covet your gift :) ,
MommaBones
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