Ten.Four Hundred & Nine

1. The sky looks like rain and I hope it delivers on its promise. 

2. Last-day-before-school kind of errands. She wants a thermos. He still needs some shorts. They all still need socks. 

3. I know what she means by being nervous. I wonder if it feels just as strange to them as it does to me to begin the school year, knowing that you will soon be uprooted and transported to a place you've never been. I wonder if the anxiety is not so much about the return, but the departure. 

4. I think of the ocean.

5. We head to Naperville to try and get her glasses fixed. They bend it back just enough to get us through until new ones will arrive. 

6. I can't find what I'm looking for and so we leave for her house. I love this sofa and this house and this corner of the street. I will miss it. I wonder whose couch I will find comfort on in California. I never did find a very good friend here. I wasn't here long enough. 

7. There, or here? Or here? I don't think we'll know until we get our feet on the ground. It's hard to explain to someone who wants to look at only data that you make so many of your decisions based on the way they make you feel.

8. But I should be working on that. 

9. Peach cobbler because there's time and it's the last night of summer vacation and I want them—and myself—to have something delicious and warm and comforting before bed. The last day. I am ready, though.

10. I facetime with my parents before I get them all into bed. They ask me about the house. I tell them that there's still been no action. We argue over the best way to cook the okra; I should fry it but in a cornmeal batter. I tell her about all the tomatoes we harvested today; my mom tells me I ought to start saving seeds because soon I won't be able to buy any. She's sounding like she did when the market last crashed. I don't think she's entirely wrong and that's why I've already got all the books. She suggests we learn Krav Maga.