On the care and keeping of bees

Today I stood in the center of a spinning cloud of bees, a living cyclone that filled the air with its sound and yet hardly moved the air.


Goodbyes are sad times.

I love the way everyone gets silly and cuddly and close during finals, the way we especially value our friends because we know that they are about to leave.
I hate the way that everyone is busy and stressed and worried at the end of the year, how everyone's hackles are but a moment from rising and how a careless, sleep deprived word inspires a growl.
I am glad that classes are over, but look forward to weeks and months ahead with many fewer friends about and silence around me instead of the comforting buzz of the hive.
I miss the challenge of structured academic learning, but revel in the freedom to take an afternoon and do everything and nothing.
I strongly dislike moving. I welcome the chance to lessen the clutter in my life and the quickening of my mother's ThrowItOut impulses, while I despair over the results of my hoarding tendencies - an inheritance from my father.
I watch my friends walk out of my life for months at a time and see the tears roll down their faces. It's not forever. It's not even Spain.
It is, however, long enough.
Tall trees outside my window shake, and the air has changed. Summer brings storms and change as my life is gathered into boxes at my feet while scattered across the country to the four winds.



I really shouldn't have packed up both of my lights; it gets really dark in here without them.