An upside-down Big Dipper is directly overhead, shining through a dark bluish-black sky. I’m seated, legs out, at the end of a blacktop driveway, hoping for a second-night showing of the Northern Lights. Even though the very spot I am sitting had a view of a massive reddish-pink and purple-streaked sky, I wasn’t here. I was an hour and a half north, straining to see something.
How do I describe this place we’re moving to? Besides a barn light a mile to my right and a blinking red light atop a tower on the horizon, there are no lights. No street lights, car lights, or house lights. Just a black silhouette of a nearby telephone pole and trees that separate me from the wide-open sky.
Poor Evelyn. The area around her eyes is reddened from too little sleep and too much sun. Thankfully, her arms and legs had long sleeves over them, as hours in the sun at an Atlanta airshow were mainly unshaded. She’s past the point of tired, bordering on madness. With reason not an option, I changed my approach from teeth brushing before telescope time to giving her the moon before a shortened teeth brushing session. She’s now on an air mattress adjacent to her cousin Annaleigh’s bed with her stuffies and two extra-large borrowed ones.
I noticed Annaleigh’s bedroom window faces the direction of our being-built house and said, “You and I can shine flashlights out our bedroom windows at each other.” Which, mark my words, I will do.
With a long day ahead of us tomorrow, I better pack it in and hit the hay. Take care.
Love, Jaclynn
Going On 40 