Cleaning House

For months, a grey presence stood in my path as I moved through the house.  I struggled around it.  I darted left; it deftly followed.  I slipped right; it lunged sideways.  I stopped and stared; it ogled back at me.

No chemical could shrivel it.  I haven’t hands strong enough to throttle the thing.  I strained to ignore its ugly mug but it hoverd behind me when I looked in the mirror.  It crouched on top of the cabinet when I do laundry.

I shook my head a dozen times a day in disgust.  The damn thing  mocked me with a leering grin.  It haunted me in my fitful sleep.

Clouds covered the delta today.  We saw the mist rolling towards us yesterday.  Billowing masses of gauze hung low and ponderous over our island, blown by a hard wind that knocked me over as I crossed to the Spindrift.  The clouds lingered all day today.  By early evening, though, the same Delta wind had cleared the sky.  I opened the door and let the air dance through my house and out the window.  I watched as the wind raised the branches of the willow, moving across the meadow into the fields beyond our park.

I caught a glimpse of a grey ghost clinging to the tail of the mischievous breeze.  It vanished as the wind rose to meet the last bright rays of the setting sun.   I drew a deep breath, then reached to shut the window and draw the curtain against the fading light.  All of a sudden, I walking through my house with a lighter step.

It’s the twenty-fifth day of the fifty-third month of My Year Without Complaining.  Life continues.

 

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