Geese call to each other across the swollen river.  I stand on its banks peering through my cell phone’s view finder,   It seems inadequate to capture the elegance of the river’s sweeping curve.  Dusk descends on the California Delta.

A car passes.  I’ve noticed that people do not raise their hands from the steering wheel as I learned to do in another life-time, north of the Louisiana delta in Arkansas.  I suppose they have their own signal of friendliness but I haven’t caught on to it yet.

I’ve been awake for more than fourteen hours.  I spent the first four or five fretting over other people’s failures, a refreshing change for me.  I have managed to cobble enough benefit from various folks’ disappointing performances at this critical stage of my life to overlook their remissions.  I have not spoken much of the professionals  who did not honor my trust, I dance around the gradations of their treachery.  I do not seek to fall into complaint but neither does it strike me as prudent to leave them free to prey on others however carelessly.  My quandary accounts for the sleepless night.

The slight chill in the air reminds me that rain has fallen here for several days running.  I pull my jacket closed and lean against the car.  A great flock of crows passes overhead.  I close my eyes.  Their song resonates on the silent water.   The river has her own life but I miss the comforting voice of my beloved sea.  I pull a long draw of air into my lungs.  It lacks the tang of the ocean but still, it refreshes me.  I face west and watch the falling light as it dances over the far line of trees.  When I have had my fill, I get back into the car and drive the rest of the way to Delta Bay.

It’s evening on the tenth day of the forty-ninth month of My Year Without Complaining.  Life continues.