postcards from a summer night

In yards everywhere, fires in fire rings of one kind or another. A fire to look at, people to look at it with, a refreshing bevvie, a bag of chips. Wealth beyond compare.

Just before total darkness, Hazel and I walked down to the boat launch. The snake undulated across the dock in front of us, then kept on undulating, transitioning soundlessly from undulating on sun-warmed wood to undulating across the surface of the cool water. Forgive me for using “undulating” words four times in a row; it’s the only word that describes what we saw there.

Walking up the street in the darkness, the first halo of headlights coming up the other side of the hill illuminated a billion insects. Who knew the air was so thick with bugs? Sometimes the sun slants into your window and lights up every speck of dust hanging there, and you think, how are we unaware of that most of the time? How do we breathe without choking? It was like that, only with bugs. I have wondered how bats find enough insects to eat, echolocation notwithstanding. Now I think they might just be filter feeders, opening their mouths and getting a mouthful. Like whales and krill. Feel free to correct any/all of my wildlife misconceptions.