In the dark

When I finally retire from my teaching job I will be a master at whiling away the hours. This afternoon, thinking I had all the time in the world, I practiced. I went downtown to buy a book, taking my camera just for fun.

One of the music shops has a surprisingly large assortment of ukeleles. Fascinating. Who buys these things, I wonder. Apparently nobody, because they have been in the window for a long time; that's okay because they look really great. Not paying any attention to the time, I took a bunch of pictures of store windows because the Friday Shoot-Out photo group has this assignment coming up.



On the way home I stopped to pick up some dog food at Petco, where it was easy to become distracted by the cats who are up for adoption.



That's when I noticed what it looked like through the windows behind the charming cat, who not surprisingly, had gone to bed. What? It was only 4:45, and getting dark fast. Time to head home. Ed and Reub are accustomed to a walk in the afternoon.

Did I just say "afternoon?"

I put on a reflective vest, bright orange just like the road crews from the local jail, and a headlamp reminiscent of a coal miner. After snapping a twinkling light onto Eddy, who is otherwise completely invisible at night, we set out on our walk at 5:15.



There are few streetlights in our neighborhood, and I am still getting used to the headlamp. It's kind of like being onstage; you can only see the illuminated path in front of you and not much else. That's why we very nearly crashed into a lady coming towards us walking a tiny angry white dog: people, carry a light, okay?




It was shockingly dark out there. Whoa, what was that? My headlamp would occasionally hit on somebody's reflective tape, plastered randomly on a mailbox.







A street sign was the brightest thing out there.

This was at 5:22PM. There were owls calling to one another.

I put the dogs in the house when I got home, and went to get in the mail. The moon was far above, and the house had a dim light showing through the narrow windows on either side of the door. Eddy was watching me through one of them.

I had forgotten to turn his light off.