The Porch Light Flickered

On a day when my age was undeniable, I was thrown back in time to the summer nights of my youth. Unwelcome in a conversation that was as vital as any I've had recently, the signal came from inside her parents' house. The porch light flashed on-off-on: time to go inside. Tonight, the porch light flickered, but we were allowed to stay out just a little while longer.

Tonight, we were girls. Jennifer in the porch swing, long legs dangling, idle feet in and out of her father's borrowed shoes; Tonya on the porch ledge, back against the pillar, leg swinging over the edge. A passerby would have seen two grown women tiptoeing around the boundaries of middle age. In a way, the passerby would have been right. Jennifer will turn 37 next month; I turned 39 this month. She has a 7-year-old son and worries that he could be an only child. I have three teenagers and worry about paying for college. These are not the worries of our youth.

However, that same passerby would have heard the soft murmurs of an easy conversation, voices filled with emotion and cushioned with the comfort of years. We talked in the way that only old friends can talk. Months pass without contact, but buried in our busy lives is a friendship that endures. Time and distance are reality. I live in Illinois and she in Indiana. We have families and jobs--we have lives. Somehow, though, this friendship lasts.

Years ago, our stream-of-consciousness conversation was about the tyranny of our parents, the demands of our teachers, and the details of our plans for and exploits in love. The stream-of-consciousness conversation still flows, but now it is about our aging grandparents, our own families, and what love turned out to be. Then and now, the conversation wove in and out of our very hearts. Our words were different from all those years ago, but the tone was the same. The difference is the undiluted honesty of our conversations now. The bravado of youth has been replaced with the courage to act on our convictions and the belief that affection and admiration should be shared.

Would that passerby have thought "middle age," or would that passerby have thought "friends?"
Both are accurate, but only one is forever.

And the porch light flashing on and off? Her son. Full circle.

Six Minutes

I keep thinking I'll get "the" sunset photo, so I took off again tonight, shortly after 8:00. The sky was beautiful, the sun was slipping down the sky, and I was idle.

Under 10 minutes passed between deciding to go and actually taking the pictures. For six minutes, I stood at the side of the road, camera clicking, filters and lenses on and off and on again, through forty pictures. In six minutes, the sun went from a fat, fluid, blinding orange in a pink sky to a wisp of pink in the dusky blue-hour sky, and then it was gone.

Six minutes.

In my non-science brain, sunsets amaze me. The sun goes down, goes away. I watch it happen. In my brain, if the sun is gone, the sky should be dark.

Instead, we are left with the most beautiful light of all.