The half-moon shone, hazy, through the film of clouds. The air hung around my neck and hands, moist, warm and exhausted from the day's heat. The cool air from the water in the park drifted up to greet the hot damp, and calmed us all.
I crossed the bridges over the speedy Parkway and the empty train tracks, descending into the grassy median between the arms of the canal. This place is still in the city - its only minutes from my house! - and its entirely man-made, but it still feels like a wild refuge to me. Here i can smell the grass and the damp earth, i can hear a breeze rustling leaves, i can see birds and bugs and other various creatures. This is Forest Park. I pay homage to this refuge in the city, by coming here for a solstice celebration. It is a time of massive changes in my life, and somehow this ride to the longest day of the year has coincided with a building unrest and momentum that seems to culminate together. It is a good place to mark time, since things change fast and i am acutely aware of these parallel tracks: my life and the rock i live on as it hurtles round the sun just so.
I settle on a broad flat sitting rock, placed ever so pleasingly with the base half in and half out of the flowing water. As i envision what i want for the coming months, for the descent into the shortest day of the year, a night heron beats a wing and seemingly out of nowhere glides above me. A passing fancy. I continue on with my envisioning, pouring my hopes and fears into a tray as salt and sugar, mix with water, taste. Then finally i throw it all to the river and the wind, and come what may. As i walk out of the park, toward the neon lights of the hospital complex just across the street, i notice the tinkling lights of the fireflies. Normally, i see a few fireflies flitting around lighting up my yard, but here: there are hundreds of them. They are in the bushes, in the trees, in the grass. Its like delicate fireworks or tiny Thai parrafin lanterns, all chaos and blinking. Its so beautiful, like Annie Dillard's descriptions of blind people who have recently been given their sight - like a tree, a forest of twinkling lights.
I don't know what will happen next, whether all my plotting and planning will be of any use, but i hope i get to keep this up, this arriving in time for the show. Happy Summer!
