AND THE BOAT SAILED ON

I was sitting on my back porch late last night. Chipmunks and squirrels made noisy passage from tree to tree, leaping from one dark density and vanishing into another with only the tremble of dark leaves to mark their journey. They were remarkably insensitive to the noise they were making, scrawny nut scavengers in a nighttime world of marauding owls and other predators. When do they sleep I wondered.

Behind the trees were the security lights of the Victorian Era museum that borders my yard. A squat, two storey wooden building which has been moved three times in its long life. Although I have stared at the structure for years an odd shift appeared as I sat quietly watching its lights flicker beyond the heavy branches of the large trees that adorn our respective properties. The building seemed to morph into an old style paddlewheeler and the lights made it appear to be moving forward beyond the thickness of oaks and other trees. I imagined it chugging its way south to New Orleans in a churn of river water, nearly concealed beyond the riverbank foliage. A “Huck and Tom” vision that made me yearn to travel. Why had I never imagined this before or seen the resemblance? The longer I watched it the more its deceiving motion persisted as it crawled beyond the thick limbed oak trees and their hanging curtains of moss and vines. A bit of history sneaking away in the solitude of night bound for places in the imagination, the trickery of lights and shadows. This morning though it was still there, its clapboard sides painted corn yellow, the porches and trim a mossy green. Tonight is another night.