Back in Buick City

The first night, velvet humid darkness, the Midwestern weather of deep summer that's inscribed in my bones. Loud cicadas, trains in the distance. A huge comfort to be what is literally "home" for my body and my "soul." Don't know what that is, exactly, but whatever essential part of me, the part that combines all the other parts and works intuitively with the universe -- that part is rooted in a Midwestern August night when the air is so thick and fragrant it's like breathing golden honey.

Second night, a raucous thunderstorm, tornadoes in Fenton just a few miles south. As agitated as the goldfinches which swarmed to the feeder on the back porch just before the storm, Ted and I wandered from window to window, outside to inside to outside, floor to floor, watching the storm come in and over. Hallelujah, I got that drenching I'd been dreaming of in arid L.A. We drove to the Red Rooster for dinner through giant puddles, cars daring each other through about a foot of rushing water the sewers couldn't handle. After two glasses of petite syrah, wilted spinach salad and scallops in a lime sauce, not to mention shared chocolate torte and an hour of conversation with Teddy and Ted about the existence of God and the chances of morality in the post-God era, I dragged Ted out for a long walk in the neighborhood. I can't go out in the dark so it was a luxury with Ted. Gilkey Creek, overflowing, sang a rushing cantata as we walked along.

Homemade pizza tonight with Gary Custer, Ed and Casey, Nic, Jessica, Mike, Roxana and those three little aliens they called chihuahua. I know this isn't exactly a diary but it was sweet out there in the lengthening shadow of the 300-year-old burr oak. Sake under the stars. Ain't so bad to be back in Michigan.