The Long Light

It was almost nine last night and still light out. I checked the clock twice because it didn't seem possible.

Dinner was over. The dishes were in the sink where I'd left them. I meant to go back in and wash them, but I sat down on the back step instead and never did. The mosquitoes found me around quarter after. I stayed anyway, which is not like me.

In January the lights are on by four. You eat dinner, clean the kitchen, and before long the day has packed itself away. I've always liked that about winter.

Summer lingers.

There are all these extra hours, and no instructions for what to do with them.

I kept thinking I should get up and do something useful. Pull a few weeds. Pick another cucumber. Tie up the tomatoes one more time.

Instead, I stayed where I was.

The hummingbirds were still darting between the flowers, just as busy as they'd been all afternoon. The tomatoes looked heavier than they had that morning, the cucumbers seemed to have appeared out of nowhere, and the squash leaves had spread a little farther across the garden. It all looked like it had been growing while I wasn't paying attention.

I spend a lot of time thinking that if I'm sitting still, something must be getting behind.

The tomatoes don't wait for me. Neither do the cucumbers or the squash. They keep growing whether I'm checking on them or not.

Eventually I went inside.

The dishes were still in the sink.