Never Lonely

Sitting out for a coffee at the edge of the canal, the sun flutters over my yellow shirt as the sumac jitterbugs in the breeze. It's more like late spring than mid-summer. The day is clear and bright, the temperature is a cool 73 degrees.

My coffee is a frozen blend of espresso, ice, milk, and a coconut syrup called Jamaican-Me-Cool.  I am pretty much alone as far as humans are concerned. A woman with two kids sits out down the way at the ice cream shop. The kids are tossing ice-cream-cone bits into the canal to feed the carp and the ducks.

    Long thin whisps
    creep over the chair edge
    Daddy-Longlegs

Later at home, I sit out back with a book and a beer. The whole world leaves me alone as the breeze swooshes the tree-tops. Blue sky, puff-pocked by clouds and deep green of the towering Black Walnut trees. I am lost in the ecstasy and the  secrecy  of the long back yards that surround me.  A pair of  squirrels spiral down a cherry tree and race across the open grass to the giant walnut and scamper up. As the breeze shifts direction a bit, I  sense friendly touch in the nostrils. Gentle and loving as an old friend the scent of the lilacs wraps around me.

From all accounts I am alone. But never lonely.