BRIGHTENING

A little girl in a big yellow plastic tub, her curls swept up with my wet hands; bobby pins from my own updo tooth-opened as I gathered up her goldy-brown hair.

A green watering can used to fill and pour, re-cycling the tub water back in upon itself, over and over; giggles as the pour ventures out upon the sidewalk; request with PLEASE for more water when the tub's level grows low.

A breakfast-for-three with an unaccustomed cereal box on the table---I don’t remember having cereal in years; I bought this because I thought we might, though we’ve eaten it only as a snack from a tiny Tupperware while communing with such as Grover and Elmo and Bert. Soft, butter-sizzled hot-dog-bun toast, smeared with a tiny slick of peach/apricot jam---a new squatty-pot thing from Smucker’s, and WOW Good.

A little bowl of strawberries, a few sticks of still-creamy Cheddar carved from the big Sam’s block; coffee in my sky-blue cup set down beside me as I sat right here at this desk five minutes after rising. The rumble of Chris’ voice during the Blessing, as we reach our hands out and hold tight, hold tight. 

A long walk round the neighborhood, with two red leashes---Girl and Pup, who both ran and chuckled all the way, stopping only to consult the grass, a rock, the customary fire hydrant (girl, not dog---she's fond of reading the letters all the way around. The other day as we rounded the corner and the tall yellow post hove in sight, she called out, "There you are!! I've MISSED you!" and ran and threw her arms around it). And guess what lucky Granny came home with dogpoo in her pocket.

Clothes on the neighbor’s line, like sails of a tall ship, but better, for they connote not travel for adventure, but the keeping of the Where You Are.

Clothes---anything just-washed---flapping on the line; that SO celebrates a Spring day, as much as daffodils.

What I imagine to be a very small bird is, for the first time ever in my hearing, actually saying Tweet Tweet in an ascending octave of sound. It’s a fairy-tale scale come to life over yonder in that tallest tree, and punctuates the already-full morning with almost more brightness than can be safely borne all at once.

I think of a word I don’t believe I’ve ever used---certainly not in conversation, I don’t think---but it fits: the liquescence of that melody is beyond mere music. It’s also color and sound and the sun through the trees.

There’s a surfeit to this day---a Gracious Plenty. The yard’s ringed round with green---spin in a circle and you’ll see every shade there is. The house, the garage, the hedges and trees wall us into this great bore of sun down into this small well of US. We’re set down deep, deep, in this big yellow tub of sun, and you could almost drown in the light and the music and the IS.

And what brights YOU today?