Sounds. Sleeping with the windows open brings me sounds, or sometimes thoughts, in one window and out the other.  Ghosts of truck tires, distant. A stiff breeze. Silence. I woke to the spotlight in my face, the moon fierce in the window. Damn, girl, don’t you know I’m tryna sleep here? (Me and her got beef, her being a silent witness and all, and I’m not going to stand for it anymore.)  I turn over to begin again.  Silence. A stiff breeze.  He began singing in the dark, an hour before the paler blue comes. He is loud, energetic as he sings the sun, singlehandedly, up from the water and into the sky. My dear friend, I wish you knew more than two lyrics, broken record dawn patrol. That’s all right. You have a job to do, and I’ll not shoo you away.

Sounds. I hear your feet below me pounding the floor as you walk from room to room which is a miracle because my hearing is blurry at best. Perhaps I feel the vibration through the walls, or I just know what to listen for.  Is it too soon to prepare myself for the slam of your door as you embark on another office day? Too soon to prepare my snarky comment, “Have a nice day!” as I watch your back, wet hair plastered to your head, stomping off to your car? Yes. It is too soon. I don’t know if responding like this to someone else’s energy is good or bad. It informs me of my own emotional tendencies, my inability to forgive “trespasses,” and tells me I should send her off with blessings if nothing else.

North wind this morning. I can see and hear the wavelets clearly, the bay scent is strong and clean. Mourning dove plays his reed. A wind-chime tinks. Refrigerator hums. Pick-up trucks throaty exhaust. Finch father calling his little ones for flight lessons today, a happy racket. Sounds like someone striking a toothbrush on the edge of the sink to cast off excess water, one two three.

By now the maintenance people would be power washing the walkways, using the leaf blower to clear off excess beach debris or the lawn edger to manicure the little bits of grass in the courtyard, but not this morning. I have a day to consider my tasks. To do them or not do them, it’s as simple as that, so sayeth Henry Rollins.  To think about another neighbor who surprises me all the time. You never really know a woman, it seems. Or anyone. I probably won’t write down at the beach today in my journal that smells like olive oil (long story) because it’s a little chilly out there, north wind and all. So many things are calling and it’s a blessing to take each one down at a time.