Composition

First he eats a tomato. He washes it and then eats it like a fruit, without salt and pepper or mayonnaise. Then he takes two bunches of small purple grapes that have grown on the yard. Now he stands at the counter and looks around. You watch him stand in front of his computer and log in to one social networking site, and then another. There's only one new friend request today, and no one has added him to their circles today. You imagine, as you sit comfortably in the next room and watch him through a doorway, that he's envisioning something. But what?

The keys begin to click. In uneven spurts and, dare we say, outbursts, he appears to be typing something. You can hear when he makes a mistake, or backtracks, as the tempo of the keying, the rhythm of it really, is punctuated by a fast and steady tatatatatat and then the more regular (uneven that is, really) business of composing while typing resumes.

The radio drones on. Slavic names. Dog day afternoon at the puppy mill. A woman who takes great pride in making the lives of 500 dogs better. She talks like she's right - like there'd never be a question that her definition of a good life, for a dog, would be standardizable and accepted in legal form by anyone who might ask. Would she imagine making the same effort for the poor and miserable people just across the river? Would she imagine pronouncing about the propriety of the living conditions of those young ones whose ages range from infancy to 18? You suspect that she finds it easy to say these things about dogs and other domesticated animals, but may not be so certain about what makes the life of a young human acceptable. 

And then there's the story of the gunman that you imagine walking out of the bush near where you're working, and taking you away at gunpoint. A gunman. You wonder why your imagining that. And what does a "gun"man" look like, actually? What part of him is the barrel? the sight? the stock? the trigger? You could use a visual cue, to be sure. But maybe that's for another day. Not likely. Sorry for taking your time.

Ride report

in:       12'C wind 10 ks SW

out:     20'C wind 15 ks WSW