Sabbat Sunday

Sabbat Sunday - At the most literal of definitions, we have:

1. A day of rest, and
2. The Day of the Sun.

Latin Sabbatum (literally a day or rest, religious connotations came later), Ancient Greek σάββατον (sábbaton),
 from Hebrew שַׁבָּת (shabát,), from Wicca (sabbat).

Originally ‘a day of rest’,  for most religions it is a day of fasts, of don’ts and other obligations.

For others it is a day of feast and celebration of the cycles of the earth and her peoples, and that is why I prefer Sabbat.

I prefer celebration to deprivation (I always fast on Mondays).  This day of the sun awaits, and I’m off to enjoy every minute of it.

Mañana y’all

I have a new Tarot deck.

My old Tarot deck perished in the fire a few years back along with so many of my things. 

Some things were easily replaced, some not. A Tarot deck is so personal, so integrated with a person's very chi, it is not as easily replaced as a couch, coffee pot or chair. 

I've been looking, but nothing clicked. Today at Golden Temple, I decided to take the leap, and if a mistake, I'll try another time til they feel right. 

Tonight I'll just shuffle and leave them on the altar amidst candles and my ladies. Tomorrow I'll try a spread or two. 

Day 24 3500+ words of 'real writing' & 1 Blog Today NaNo / NaBlo

Day 24 of NaNoWriMo Wordcount 50,300/ NaBloPoMo (24 for 24) 

Sunday is my fun day…, and although I don’t really have any more Dilbertville Manic Mondays in my life, tomorrow begins Thanksgiving’s home stretch prep with all its incumbent chores, and check lists. 

Also, during this NaNoWriMo marathon, I’ve neglected too many other writing and painting objectives on my ToDo list.  Those neglected items stand a better chance of garnering income than the fledgling first draft of a novel I’ve just raced through.  I’m entering my current word count to register my ‘finished/winner status’; printing out a triple spaced copy to let cool off before beginning my red pen editing/rewrite process the week after Thanksgiving; and moving on to the neglected items on my list.  I’ve already taken care of # 1 on my list:

1. Query one of my Children’s’ picture books to half a dozen agents.  (done)
2. Follow up with the editor at Victoria Magazine to check the scheduling of my essay for their 2014 calendar.  Finalize, photograph and post to Amazon 10 paintings that are in various stages of completion.
3. Monetize my WordPress Blog.
4. Contact 10 affiliate markets on my list.
5. Finish building my website beyond the starter page I threw up a year ago.

And so much more…

Excerpt from Murder is a Primary Color:The Ghost

The sun could not chase away the chill Jade felt.  She shivered again.  The prospect of mind probe with that man was not a happy one.  James was on his phone already calling in the particulars to his captain, asking for permission for a probe and trace implant in case of escape.  It would take at least 24 hours for permission to probe, but the trace implant was an automatic.  He would try to expedite it if he could.  He could only hold Kane for 48 hours without some hard evidence he told her.  "Ghosts can't testify and she doesn't seem to know anything about how this happened.

Jade was walking back to the house, Sabrina draped across her shoulder face forward as she stroked her white fluff of hair just under her chin.  "Not bad old girl, not bad at all." her thoughts went out.

Hmmmmm, Brie purred, what happened to 'old woman'?

"Don't know, old girl, she seems to have left us."

The kitchen staff watched gape-mouthed from the kitchen doorway.  As Jade approached she sent calming thoughts and then stopping at their door, she smiled at them until she received tentative smiles back.  "It's OK she reassured them.  This is my good old girl, Brie.  She won't hurt anyone unless they plan on harming me.  Mr. Kane is under suspicion of wrong doing.  Please go about your business and don't leave the premises in case we need to ask more questions.  Thank you."  She walked past them to the hall and up the stairs to the room where that which was once Mrs. Kane paced.

Jade sat in the chair by the fire and waited, stroked Brie and prepared.  Mrs. Kane walked over and sat in the chair opposite her.  "Did he do it?  Did he kill me?  And how can I be dead?  I'm sitting here, you can see me, hear me, and I don't understand."

"Life has many levels.  Our bodies are just one of many dwelling places for that life.  You are life, some people call it soul and right now, you still have the form of your most recent body.  You never experienced your death, so you still project this form.  Perhaps when we solve your situation, you will let go and grow and assimilate all your lives and choose to be born again.  Perhaps you'll travel the stars awhile and visit the planets, and sing awhile with the universe.  There are many options before you now - in many ways broader than the life of your once corporeal body."

"I want to believe that.  Would you help me?  Right now all I know is, I'm dead and nothing more, and I’m scared"

"Of course, I'll help you.  For now though, I need a little more help from you."

Jade prepared as she faced the ghost of Mrs. Kane.

Mañana y’all.

Day 23 Again only 2500 words & 1 Blog Today NaNo / NaBlo

Day 23 of NaNoWriMo Wordcount 46,777/ NaBloPoMo (23 for 23) 

Rainy day view from my aerie

So far, so good.  The Blog a day is pretty much a rambling journal entry with excerpts from my WIP (work in progress aka my NaNo Novel).  Piece of cake for someone used to journaling daily.  I just have to remember not to err on the side of TMI.  I can also schedule it to drop around 7pm when most of my followers might actually see and read it.  Still have way more followers on my WordPress blog (265) which I post identically to my Blogspot blog (25).  No clue, why. First of the year, I'll probably upgrade WordPress.

Keeping up my momentum on the novel’s wordcount is not as easy, but I’m still ahead of schedule.  I keep reminding myself to just write, just write, just write.  I fell 1000 short of the 3500 words I wanted to do yesterday (Friday) and again today, but I have lots to do that does not involve writing and if I get back to 3500 on Sunday, I’ll  cross the 50,000 word finish line even if I have not really finished the novel.  

I have, as I think I mentioned earlier, written the last chapter however thin it appears right now.  I saw it and had to get it down then and there and then go back to driving my plot and characters toward that endgame. 

I should have run errands yesterday while the weather was mere wet, today is damned cold, and I’d rather stay in with my little heater whirring away, but gotta stock up for Thanksgiving, etc.

Excerpt from Murder is a Primary Color:Kane

James was listening, grim-mouthed, and the ghostly apparition just sat and wept.  A noise at the door alerted them all that they had another listener.  James was up in a flash, out the door and down the stairs in hot pursuit of Kane.

Jade, close behind him, sent out her mind touch to follow Kane and reach out to him and find something that would make him traceable in case he escaped.  Brie leaped to the window and the white lioness leaped to the ground and brought the big man down.

A deafening roar shook the trees and birds scattered before the ancient threat.  The maid and cook ran from the kitchen to the back to see what was going on and were aghast.  Mr. Kane lay face up in utter terror and upon his chest was the small white cat they had fed earlier. 

James came up and Sabrina leapt aside to watch.  Kane stared, first in confusion then anger overtook him.  "Illusion, damned, illusion" and his eyes met the cats and there was a barrier to further examination.  Then he raised his eyes as James cuffed him, and he saw Jade and his icy stare hardened more.  "Witch!  You don't know who you're dealing with.  You just don't know."

Jade's schooled stone face belied the chill of icy cats’ paws down her back.  This was just a dance of fencers, a feint and parry and the battle as yet not joined.  She knew it in her bones.

Mañana y’all.

Day 22 Just 2500 words today & 1 Blog Today NaNo / NaBlo

Day 22 of NaNoWriMo Wordcount 44,277/ NaBloPoMo (22 for 22) 

Writing on Novel was a little slow this morning in part due to the bottomless champagne glass at the McMinn Clinic last night, but meeting a friend for a dos Equis at Jim ‘n’ Nicks and perhaps the glass of Cabernet I poured when I got home have something to do with it. 

Anywho, I got up poured a cup of coffee, put a Stauffer’s Spinach soufflé on the counter to thaw, grabbed the tiny tablet-sized TV from its kitchen corner and climbed back into my warm bed.  Sipping coffee, I alternately watched the Today Show and along with Jazmine watched the crazy squirrels bouncing on unsteady tree branches just outside the windows.

I can only stay in bed so long, but although brief it was a nice idyll and out of my normal routine.  I turned the oven on to 375, preheated my smallest iron skillet which I’d smeared with bacon drippings.  There’s nothing like the aroma of bacon.  You can use butter or any oil you choose, but I happen to love bacon fat for certain things like cornbread or cooking breakfast.  Everytime I cook bacon, I transfer the drippings to a small mason jar in the fridge.

The soufflé was thawed enough to cut up and fit in the skillet.  I don’t and won’t own a microwave.  I don’t and won’t cook in those plastic containers that frozen box food comes in.  I’ve turned down the only coffee in sight if it was served in Styrofoam, never used Teflon or other coated cookware.  I’ve always been this way which made many of my friends laugh at what they thought were my peculiar obsessions back in the day.  Now with all the stories circulating about dangers of microwave cooking and plastic containers and all the other toxins we consume daily, many of them have jumped on my bandwagon.

Excerpt from Murder is a Primary Color:Virtual Search (cont’d)

 Hurley turned to Janet and smiled, "Some hunky guide - Don't suppose we can have a Stephanie next time?  Let's eat, I'm starved."

Janet laughed, stuck the flashdrive into her Levi’s watch pocket, texted the cab service, and they left arm in arm to find a pizza and discuss their findings.  They rode in silence down the lift to the tram-stair to the ground and the waiting servocab.  "I better call Jade" remarked Janet as the car seat formed around her like a glove and secured her gently in place.  She spoke to the phone in her lap "phone Jade face to face"  the panel in front of her lit and a disembodied voice said "Accessing".

Jade's face appeared.  "Hello Janet, what did you find?"

"Lot's, whatever you do, don't let Kane out of your sight.  Jade, there's lots but here's the nut:  One, all victims are women; two, all had husbands, estranged or divorced or just out of town at the time.  And Jade three.  Three, all the men came out of nowhere just nowhere and they're all gone with no trace - nor forward except your Mr. Kane.  If he gets away, you'll never find him.  We're going to follow a few loose ends, but that's the nut."

Mañana y’all.

Day 21 Another 3500+ words & 1 Blog Today NaNo / NaBlo

Day 21 of NaNoWriMo Wordcount 41,777/ NaBloPoMo (21 for 21) 

Made my wordcount for the day on NaNo anything I write this afternoon, I'll tack on to tomorrow's count. Friday's need all the help they can get.  Might not be much as I'm going to the McMinn Clinic's open house "Botox, Bubbles and Bling" - for the Bubbles and Bling, not the Botox as I'm pretty content with my 64 yr old face.  Shifting gears now to Throwback Thor's Day and Queries. 

It’s Throw back Thor’s Day and I haven’t posted any retro pictures yet on Facebook.  I’ve joined some of my friends who post old pics from the way we were way back then – such fun (using powerpoint to compose the collage).

Throw Back Thor's Day 10/24/13

I started posting because since the fire in 2011, I’ve been scanning all the photos that we rescued soaking wet from the firemen’s thorough dousing before they’re faded beyond recall.

It was a 3 alarm fire and I’m still amazed that we were able to rescue as much as we did.  The fire was on a Saturday morning, and although I did a brief walk through with one of the firemen, my friend across the hall died in the fire and I just wanted the comfort of my mother’s home that day.  My cat and I spent the next 6 months there.  Moms are wonderful.

The Monday after the fire, my brother and I went back the following Monday to see what we could salvage.  It was apparent that thieves who prey on others misfortunes had already been rifling through things, but the trunks with all the old pics were in a corner of the bedroom which had half the roof and beams caved in upon it.

Tommy came over with his crowbar to pry open the warped closet doors; a sweet older street person volunteered to help and could he have one of my beers.  He probably saved my brother’s bad back some trauma by doing most of the heavy lifting.  He wanted nothing but the initial beer I handed him while we were taking a break, but I got a 12pack and $20 cash back at Wilson’s market next door to hand him when we were ready to leave.  He still waves hi whenever I see him in the neighborhood on my walks. 

Excerpt from Murder is a Primary Color:Virtual Search

The servo-cab eased away leaving Janet and Hurley on the curb leading to the Mayax University Library.  Janet loved this place.  Spire upon spire of glass and granite, like strong delicate fingers, reached through the very clouds to the heavens.  Janet and Hurley immediately hit the tram walk and then the lift, side by side, looking down as the ground fell away below them, and the servo-cab became one more dark green speck merging with the silver ribbon of roads that lead everywhere.  The Library entrance was a line of demarcation:  Through the prism of doors lay a soft expectant silence.  The din of the city hushed behind them by their noiseless closing.

Janet knew the way, down hushed halls of mauve and blue and silver hues and reflections of themselves on mirrored walls.  The private room she had called ahead and reserved was keyed to her prints alone - no lines to mess with - a privilege of faculty.  She touched her hand to the silver panel by the silver door, it glowed and the door parted.  She and Hurley walked in and sat at the control panel.  Hurley started punching contact keys, and Janet spoke "Computer, program being fed with parameters for a search.  Priority is A-A1-A, clearance is WWIII, all access, planet wide.  Request holographic mode with guide.  Please check voice print and proceed."

"Working", came the disembodied voice a second before materializing into a very attractive fair-haired male of about 25 who said, "Voice-print identified, verified, access approved.  Good morning, Janet, I am Stephos, we can proceed."

And proceed they did, wending their way through circuits and corridors, seeing images of people and places, the Kanes and others.  At each point asking for data to be added to file for later hard copy.  It seemed like days, but it was only two hours before they were through.  Real time suspended when virtual time took over.  They had what they needed and the hard copy was just printing as they leaned back and bid adieu to Stephos., "Thank you Stephos, please save the entire program to my voice print and access code," Janet finished.

"Program is saved.  Hard copy is generated. Guide terminating."  He winked out and room became just another room again.

Mañana y’all.

Day 20 Another 3500+ words & 1 Blog Today NaNo / NaBlo

Day 20 of NaNoWriMo Wordcount 38,277/ NaBloPoMo (20 for 20) 

Wednesday is hump day for my buds still working in Dilbert’s realm, but it’s just another great day for me.  I still can’t believe I lived long enough to retire on social security, and wonder of all wonders, it is enough to pay all the bills with a bit left over for fun. 

I say retired, but I’m not one to just up and quit doing; I’m just doing what I want to do instead of what others want me to do.  Now all those things I did on the side such as my writing, painting, and photography are my primary occupations.  I’m loving it, especially in this studio/office I call my aerie.  Three large windows let it so much light, ad the French doors to the living room let me watch the TV if I want while never leaving my desk.

I finished one small e-book and uploaded it to Amazon’s e-pub platform.  I’ve been working on queries for my children’s picture book. I’ve been painting a series of small paintings on rescued wood that will probably be on sale the first of the year.

Right now, I’m determined to finish a novel during National Novel Writing Month (nanowrimo.org) and post a Blog a day.  So far so good.

Excerpt from Murder is a Primary Color:The first Battle 

Jade lifted the bottle from its satin nest, and set it on the table between Sabrina and her.  She broke its seal, and removed the stopper and was pushed back into the chair by the sheer force of the hot, raw rage that roiled forth from the bottle.  It assaulted her senses like a physical force.

She kept it at bay but felt it’s hot pressure against the personal shield that surrounded her.  Holding her protection close, she mentally wended her way through the maze of emotion.  How can one explain the journey of the mind self?  She entered the bottle and was in a room, a long and dark room.  She walked in this darkness and one by one, she lifted curtains, pulled them down, folded them, smoothing them and laying them one by one beside the path she walked. 

Step by careful step, Jade walked until midway there was something just on the edge of vision. It lurked in wait and then was there full blown before her.  Its vile and bilious words were spewed slime and acids against her protective bubble, and it tore at her mind with hot tongs. 

Then Jade heard a roar and there between them was a star-white moon-eyed lioness.  Her roar became many icy shards speeding toward their mutual enemy.  He cringed and took a step back.  She roared again, and the darts issued forth again - white fire from a dragon's mouth - each finding its mark.  The lioness paced back and forth before Jade, pushing him back and back. 

Be gone, she roared.  Desist!  Go back to the hole of hell from whence you came.  She roared again, and white-hot flames licked out and caught at the fringes of his black cloak. 

Jade began to chant the words learned in childhood, words that till now were but words.  She watched as each word she mouthed and each rune she drew in the air became blue-white shards of stardust that flew toward the enemy.  He grew smaller; he was fading, but not finished.  He screamed forth black words of acid venom that met hers in mid-air but the diamond shield did not yield. 

The Lioness roared again spat forth white flame that pushed through and the black reeking words, and he was lost in the wail of fear that followed him down a long black path that closed behind him.

Shaking but determined, Jade continued through the maze and the rage ahead was ebbing.  Curiosity and then hope glimmered ahead and then she could sense a desperate plea.  "Oh, please, who's there?  Please, please, find me.  Over here, please help me.  I'm here."

Mañana y’all.

Day 18 Another 3500+ Writ & 1 Blog Today NaNo / NaBlo

Day 18 of NaNoWriMo Wordcount 31,155/ NaBloPoMo (18 for 18) 

Mondays at home are so much better than a Monday at the office – I remember them well.  Although on my last job before retiring I worked from Tuesday thru Friday, so I missed out on those manic Mondays. 

Writing is going smoothly. I’m ahead of schedule and characters are shaping up, and I’ve written the last chapter which is so thin it’ll take considerable fleshing out when I get there next week some time.

Excerpt from Murder is a Primary Color:Jade

The reflection in the mirror looks odd to me.  Every now and then, I seem to go to the extreme.  The black-haired reflection wore black every day now, be it a cat-suit with cloak, a skirt with leggings, shoes and/or boots, jeans and a black silk poets blouse, with no relief save a save a belt, now gold, now silver around a waist so slender, the glint of precious metal small relief for such a somber canvas.

Men lean toward fast and flashy cars; women go for clothes or in extremis, the hair.  We cut and color arrange and rearrange, swear we don't care and begin again.  I wonder though at our battle with gray and everything else.  Why should it be a battle.  I want to reach out and embrace nature.  Right now the wheel has not yet reached darkest night.

Last night was Winter's reminder "not yet, my turn still".  The old woman won't let the maiden hurry her along.  We need them both.  We are them both.  The trinity of woman is maiden, woman, crone.  We celebrated our trinity openly before the Christians stole our days and ways and renamed them for their own purpose; before they pointed their collective finger and declared all that is natural vile and evil. 

Because the matriarchs of the Wyse would not bend knee nor submit to inferiority, would not be quiet or still knowing what we knew.  And one by one they slew us and others making weapons of their god's name and driving it into innocent's hearts.  Yes one by one in the thousands they slew, and far too few flew.  We hied to cover and nurtured our own and our ways and now we are strong again in numbers and powers as the new age dawns and we look at the Christian's trail of blood as we hear the earth in throes of agony for the harm done her.  Our time is coming again.  When it does, we'll sort through the rubble and heal where and how we can. 

Mañana y’all.

Day 16 Another 3500+ words & 1 Blog Today NaNo / NaBlo

Day 16 of NaNoWriMo Wordcount 24,155/ NaBloPoMo (16 for 16) 

Today is Saturday, and I wrote late into last night and picked back up again from 6 a.m. this morning coffee in hand to meet my word count for the today.  I’m writing this Blog and scheduling it to post tonight at 7 p.m., as I’m picking Mom up for breakfast this morning around 9:30 and it’s almost 9 now.  She and I are off to Cocina Superior at Brookwood Mall for a Mexican breakfast of bacon and egg tacos, thick creamy black beans, fried breakfast potatoes and lots of their smoky hot salsa. 

Maybe I should call it Brunch since Mom always has one Bloody Mary and I have 2 or 3 Mimosas and 2 or 3 cups of coffee.  Mimosas and Bloody Mary’s are $2 or they were the last time we were there.  They only open early on Saturday and Sunday for breakfast/brunch.  We always take the third table by the window, so we can watch the activity on the street: walkers, runners, gardeners tending the potted plants and sweeping the sidewalks, and the food wagon lady delivering her home-cooked fare to the wait staff up and down the street.

By the time we’re finished eating, the stores will be open and we plan on getting a little bit of Christmas shopping and/or looking done. 

I probably will not get back to my desk for NaNo

Excerpt from Murder is a Primary Color:

Leaving for Mayax University

Just north of town west of that awesome concrete ribbon that circled the city, called the Loop, rose Mayax University.  It was a city unto itself.  From a hard-packed rocky floor where once you could see for miles, rose man-made edifices of stone and glass and walkways and trees grew where none had grown before

It loomed in the distance as I drove in from the mountains.  The new land rover handled well.  Father had surprised with it this morning.  "So you can always get home, no matter the terrain.  Do well daughter."  He took my shoulders with his large gentle hands and kissed me on the forehead, turned and went back through the house. 

I knew he would go to his chair on the back porch to smoke his pipe and contemplate the mountain.  As I watched his tall lean figure walking away, I sensed an odd mixture of emotions: love, fear, loss all a jumble - so hard to sort. 

Nanna patted my arm.  "No worry Jadee, no worry.  He is a good man, but just a man.  He never understood you had to go away and now you are back a day and again you must go away.  You were his favorite you know - go everywhere with him, hunt and ride and climb trees.  He is so proud and loves you so much.  Send him thoughts of love and visit when you can.  You can do no more."

"I always felt loved Nanna; I'll be back as often as I can.  I promise."

Then it was mother's turn.  "Don't do guilt little one.  You are a good daughter, and we are as good a parents as we know how to be.  Letting go is part of parenting, but knowing it does not make it easier.  You belong to yourself and to your destiny.  Always remember this.  We bear children, but we do not own them.  We share a place and space in time with them, nurture, teach and love them and let them be the best that they can be and that can only happen if they are free. Be free.  We all know you love us.  We will come to see you soon in your new house.  Nanna and I have some things to bring you.   Be well."

I climbed in the rover top down and was off bag and baggage and a sack of lunch down the twisting path to the silver ribbon that would take me to the city and the House.

Mañana y’all.

In this parallel we dream on

Solstice came and went this shortest day, now longest night, and we are still here.  The dread event deflected by concerted thought of certain minds with certain powers, and the world will never know the truth.

One Mayan Bactun ended and it did not bring the end of time nor life on earth, but for me it is the death of things as they are now.  I’m moving on to uncharted waters in 2013.
 
I’ve prepared this evening’s candles and writ a simple invocation, née petition, née spell, for prophetic dreams of the path that lies ahead for me.

I am one with the uni verse – See me.

Let me slip easily into the stream of time – Hear me.

Let me acknowledge my past, and accept my now – Help me.

Let me see in dream a little of my path ahead – Grant me.

That given time to contemplate, I may make better choices – Guide me.

As I give myself up to the I am and slip into dream. Protect me.

So mote it be.

♪♫•*♪♫•*¨*•♪♫•*¨*•.¸¸♥¸¸.•*¨*´*。.❄¨¯`*✲。❄*´*

Seti's Chronicles 2012 – Touch and Go.

Excerpt from Work in Progress: Seti's Chronicles - Surviving 2012


It’s still touch and go, we couldn’t and still can’t save everyone. To try would doom us all. Now the work begins. Little by little, we have to go out into what remains of our world; make contact and piece by piece reassemble society. The old refrain is true, united we stand, divided we fall. Will I live to see it done? Perhaps, some. My calling was scribe, and now we’ve come through the most perilous part of this journey, I can resume that mantle.


Where do I begin, for begin I must, to put our story in some order for the future, for our children, for posterity. I want them to know what it took to bring us through the Fall to here.


The ‘Fall’, so simple a word for that day – so trite. That crisp crystal afternoon just ten days ago stands out in high relief. A winter’s solstice unlike any before and hopefully any to come. The trees whispered to me as I left the park and crossed the busy street to meet Kiri for lunch. Seated at our regular window table with view of Layton Park my inner ear listened to the conversations here and there at the tables around the room.


"Those damn witches" whispered the perfectly coifed blond to her clone companion, "It's all their fault. Everyone at the meeting Sunday agreed." Her friend, her mirror, nodded solemnly as her eyes darted around the room.


"I tell you" the rest dwindled to indecipherable whispers, but I heard the words in my mind’s eye, the thoughts so thick with fear and anger and more. The more was an overwhelming helplessness.


I listened and wondered at the women at the table behind me. I wondered how many like her there were, who never saw the larger picture, and rather than own their part in disaster would rather kill the messenger for the news she bore somehow thinking it would save them.


Sad and wearied by the waves of negative thoughts, I sent out calming emanations throughout the room, wanting a peaceful atmosphere for this last visit to a treasured place. I lifted their fear with soothing thoughts of reassurance tugging pleasant memories to the fore of love and children and happy times. A mind joined me in the task, and I looked across to the hostess station to see Kiri approaching. Our eyes met as Kiri waved the hostess away, and gestured in my direction.


As she joined me, we mused mind to mind, "It seems many of us are loathe to think of losing all the familiar places, and so we lunch and have tea and dinner, first here, then there. "Oh, Kiri, I'm not ready to see it end; I'm just not ready."


"No one is, no one ever is ready to let go of what we know. You are not alone in that, Seti."


“Kiri, even some friends will die in the coming Storm. The ‘coming Storm’ – ‘Mother Storm’. How trite. I can hardly stand it sometimes. Damn it! It is the end of our lives, as we now know them. We plunge into the abyss. We glimpse hell. And the hardest part of all is I know I will survive. Am I really up to it? gods'us, grant it."


"Yes, you are. You are stronger than all of us - stronger than you know. And for what it's worth, I like Mother Storm best. Even now, she groans here and there; small lava flows have been sighted in unlikely places; migration patterns have become erratic - aberrant, to those who don't know. The birds know North and South are no longer constant, so they wait. They may not have far to go. They only have to stay airborne when the time comes. Will the poles shift or have we done enough to defray it?”


"Well, we’ll know soon. We've known it was soon for some time, but I want it done – I want to fast-forward to the other side. It’s been 27 years, 27 years of meticulous planning.”


"That long? By the Powers, when you put a real number on the years, it makes me feel so old. Yet, this is barely the beginning; I have a very long way to go. Kiri, I'm afraid sometimes, that I won't have the strength for the long haul."


"Of course you will. You really are stronger than you know, and we've prepared so well. Everything is in place now: the Schools, stores of food, knowledge archives, seeds and all the other sundry things to rebuild a civilization with a memory of who they are intact.


Our waitress came with tea and saké. We watched respectfully. In two small hands, with a pristine clean white cloth, she held the pot and poured first the steaming green tea then the warmed saké, pale Citroen into the small white bowls of blue porcelain cups trimmed in slightly faded gilt. With utmost attention to each small task she returned the teapot to its cozy and the saké flask to its hot water bath with no water spilt, then neatly folding the white cloth, placed just so to complete the still life before us. With a bow she departed on the cat's feet that brought her leaving us to contemplate the curls of steam.


"Oh, Kiri! I'll miss this. I have memorized every moment, the tilt of head and preciseness of movement; the curling tendrils of steam lifting the fragrance of the tea; the hot silk taste of the saké sliding down to merge with my very blood and sending warmth and well-being coursing through veins that run so cold with foreboding."


Thus warmed, we crossed to the park where the trees' song hummed in our minds: a song so old - of life and death and forever and I remembered a line from childhood, " ‘...touch a leaf and the stars vibrate…’.Leaves die and the barren trees sleep through Winter and dream of Spring. How many of us will really survive this bleakest Winter. How many of us will reach Spring?" I stopped short and looked at Kiri.


"I felt it too." she almost shouted.


For one frozen moment etched forever into my being, it was as if the Earth caught her breath. No wind stirred the trees, no bird sang, people everywhere stopped and looked around. Then it came, the birds as one lifted to the sky and the earth heaved. The day rent asunder and terror ran cold then hot on the heels of frightened people running to they knew not where.


The street rippled gray waves beneath their feet, breaking into rubbled surf pounding them into the gaping maws of asphalt caves. Buildings fell into themselves and spewed life and death onto unsuspecting heads.


© Perle Champion
Next: The Fall