The Firmament

Noon.

Church was pretty good today. I certainly like the cooler weather much better now that it’s here. It was good for me to get out of the house and mix with people. Nancy said she couldn’t believe that I’d never read East of Eden and I ought to do that. She is not the only one I know who really liked that book.

Right now my mind is a blank slate. I hear the squirrels scampering over the roof while the sun tries to appear. I know there are deep and painful feelings concealed from myself down inside. Early this morning I stopped on the sidewalk to scan the sky. It was quite dark and the clouds were autumnal and evocative of other times hidden within me. They formed a patchwork of my memories, with behind them the soul of space like an ocean of air. Below, the tree line, and to the west the apartments built three years back, at the time my own house was restored. People and things come and go like clouds in heaven. The firmament alone does not perish.

Once on that same sidewalk I found a black sun hat ironically soaked by the rain and appropriated it myself. I took it home, drip dried it on the curtain rod, and started wearing it next day. This “hobo hat” is long since lost, but it was the time that I began planning my recovery.

Advertisement