Asakiyume mita

It should be all right to leave the stove on if I'm going to just step out into the front yard to pick some basil, probably all right to not even turn the burner to low, because it's a matter of seven long strides (if that) to the corner of the yard, where, in daytime, the basil grows, and logic and experience dictates that it will still be there even in night, even though my eyes are not adjusting that fast to the thick, thick darkness that's gotten everywhere. I can just about see the birch tree, and I duck under it.

"And I thought maybe I smelled something burning, and when I came down, the whole stove was in flames," will be what my son says when the reporters ask him about the fire that engulfed the house because I didn't turn off the stove when I wandered into the front yard and was engulfed by, or drowned or dispersed in, the dark, never to return.

So I think as I zombie walk over to where the basil should be. Then I wave my hands up, down, until they hit leaves. Then I grab some, and sniff them, and they are in fact basil! So I grab a few more.

My eyes have acclimated for the return journey, and back in the house I see I've gotten the flowering tip of one basil plant. So now this meal will have a few tiny white blossoms in it as well.

Also, the kitchen didn't catch fire, the house is whole--all is well. And now we'll eat.

At this latitude, at this time of year, it's easy to walk into nighttime--it comes rushing up to meet you. Tonight small birds were employing their magic to disguise themselves as leaves: sparrows fluttered up off the ground--then became elm leaves when I looked more closely; a killdeer or other small plover ran across the road, but feeling my eyes on him, became an oak leaf.

It was still daytime--but only just--when, after one failed attempt, I worked up nerve to go down the long drive and then up the forbidding steps of the house that's attached to the property where the goat was. I had a carrot for the goat and a note to leave if no one was home. The house was as tumbledown as everything else. There was an artificial pine wreath on the door, which was encouraging, but snarling dogs jumped at the door's window when I knocked, which was not. I didn't leave my note. I walked around to where I had seen the goat before, but she wasn't in her little pen.

The sky was pink when I went to the little shrine of glass and candles beside our church and left an offering for other people's hopes and prayers (and also for the goat).

Night had settled in to roost by the time I was buying eggs at the convenience store.

"Someone's parked in your loading ramp; you'll have to have 'em towed," said an old guy to the young and handsome manager.

"No, no, that's me," said the manager. "I'm parked there."

"I know, I know it's you; I'm kidding you," said the old guy.

"That's my Mercedes--how to you like it?" asked the manager.

"That's not a Mercedes; that's one of those Hondas or something," said the old guy. "I bet you only bring out the Mercedes when you're taking out the girls."

"It's not a Honda, it's a Mazda," said the girl at the checkout.

"Yeah, a Mazda; my Mercedes is a Mazda," said the manager.

"Mazda, Honda, one of those foreign cars," said the old guy (which I thought was amusing, because what's a Mercedes then?)

As I left, the old guy said to me, "Stay warm!"

I thanked him and told him I would.