one-thirty in the morning brought a fire drill and a thunderstorm. after half-awake, half-drunk college kids poured out of the building and filed back in, the rain intensified, and the sky pounded outside my open window--open to the night, absolutely. as always. come three a.m., i rested my head, two feet from the water and the wind. the sky finally cleared, and i craned my head back to see the moon in the maine night sky, shrouded by shredded clouds. bright white, ominous with tawny streaks throughout. six hours later, the drizzly spring day was blooming full force. i quietly rejoiced.
a walk behind and around heights surprised me perhaps more than last night's unexpected thunder. it turns out that i live on a grassy knoll if there ever were one, and my window is yards away from runnals hill; a forest of fresh mulch, damp pines, fanning leaves, and bright magenta fuchsia bushes. tiny wild flowers--purple and white--with minuscule yellow centers grow freely beneath shady bowers, and it's hard to tell where campus ends and wilderness begins...until campus begins again!
the sledding hills are covered in lush grass, and the ground is softer than i can ever remember it. sometimes, i think the ground is and always was frozen solid as linoleum, ungiving. i already miss the hard ground, but i'm glad it's no longer frozen. this summer will be full of late-afternoon naps (with deet galore--turns out the stuff promotes neurite growth??), books from the library by the dozen, dreams of winter, and fears of old.
intrnasal administration of rat mesenchymal stem cells to mouse models can wait for now. just for a few minutes while i think ahead to summer days when i'll be looking back to this very moment of expectancy.
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