A refrain rambled through my head all day. Sparked by a message from someone whom I adore in Kansas City, Cindy Cieplik, the positive affirmation chugged its way around a loop typically shrouded in billowing smoke from an antiquated coal train. I can always count on Cindy to spread joy.
I worked half of the day, hammering at injunctions and letters, fighting a corrupted Outlook file that won’t be fixed until next week. A fly had followed me into the suite. Other than it and me, no other sentient being stirred. I worked alone today. A little after one, I called it quits and headed to the Loop, with a lazy stop at Robin’s Nest, the local thrift store.
All the while, the pleasant refrain inspired by Cindy’s early morning post drifted through my brain.
As I turned onto Brannan Island Road, a white flutter halted me. I watched as an egret gazed over the San Joaquin. It turned and stepped in front of me, skittering back when a car came from the other direction. I held my breath, filming as he lifted the spindles of its legs to forge forward. I had to drop the phone at the tap of a vehicle’s horn. The noise startled the bird and it lifted its wings, rising to the tender air of winter and out over the river.
I don’t know why he crossed the road in the first place. But I remain humbled by the chance to have watched it happen.
It’s the seventh day of the sixtieth month of My Year Without Complaining. Life continues.