Crows and Raindrops

While I was waiting for the rain, watching the clouds speed northward as though intending to pass us by entirely, the crows came swirling and looping up the canyon. I have yet to learn why so many crows choose to live here or even whether they go elsewhere at times. But when they are here, they number in the hundreds, engaging in raucus conferences while strutting on the hillsides or perching like so many black Christmas decorations on the tip of each branch of a single tree. This morning a flock of them came all in a rush, riding the currents of stormy air, putting on an aerial show to rival the Blue Angels (or is it the Blue Devils?). Quite a dance that went on for an hour or more. Then the rain began about 11:30 and the crows have gone for cover. Well, they may be bird brains, but they have sense enough to come in out of the rain, I guess. So, rain is definitely falling--more than the customary drizzle that we boast is rain but not yet the "one inch per hour" we've been led to believe will come at times. The soaked earth is no longer dusty gray but has taken on the color and texture of a rich milky chocolate. The windows are painted with drops that run and gather and fall along pathways fixed by the laws of physics and fluid dynamics. The world . . . well, the canyon, at any rate . . . feels primitive, as though the rain is washing away the thin veneer of civilization we impose, supposing it means we've conquered the wildness. I feel the presence of the ancient native tribes who might once have huddled against the chill, here on this land, and waited for the coming of the waters. If I should go, in the rain, to that high shale cliff, would it feel as though they walked all around me? Thoughts that come when the canyon is wet with the first real rains of winter.

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I've played my new electronic piano (thank you, so much, my dear friends), trying out the Fisherman's Hornpipe and Turkey in the Straw and doing not so badly, trying to expand beyond the favorites that I usually play in company (all of which are wonderful, mind you). What a pleasure it is to sit down at the piano, facing the rain-wet window with the blurry image of my gorgeous pepper tree just beyond. Life is just pretty darn great right at this moment.

(Here are the notes I'm playing, all lined up on the staff for me.)

Thanks for listening to me. I hope it's not blathering drivel to you.