The Winds

The winds had returned.  They had been frozen in position for months, molecules held suspended in the arctic, and were coming to life again. First with a jiggling of
Brownian motion, animated by the warmth of the sun, escaping in eager wisps and then on one brilliant day, they had broken free and came sweeping in hot moist plumes across the lakes, across the plains and the fields and the houses.
They came pushing and agitated through Ellen's kitchen door, where she stood, sweeping the dried winter leaves out of the sun porch, wondering if it was too early to set the rattan furniture out.  It was late afternoon and in her faded jeans and blue t-shirt, covered by a loose denim shirt, she moved the old worn broom like a dance partner and it felt good. 

"You can't trust these spring winds," she advised Thelma, her tabby cat, who was slipping between her feet.  "They always tease you, get your hopes up." 
It was as if the winds were breathing a secret to her - she could feel them slide along her arms and whisper in her ear making her tingle at the base of her neck - coming in a furtive transmission.  It made her restless, anxious.

She stopped sweeping to take off the shirt, ran her hand through her bobbed dark 
hair that was threaded with silver, arched her back and pulled the warm moist fresh air deep into her lungs.  Squinting into the sun, she could see the light lancing through the yet bare branches.  The winds were a courier; they came every year with a message so tempting that it made her agitated, like she was going to squirm out of her skin, maybe like she was molting.  She wondered if she was going to do anything about it this time.

The pungent scent of onions and pot roast in the slow cooker eased out onto the porch, reminding Ellen of the time. 

"Thelma, Dave's going to be here any minute and the bread isn't ready and the wine isn't cold yet."  The broom left standing in a corner, she came in from the porch and the force of the wind slammed the door shut.

There they sat, just as they always have, just as she knew they would.  Dave was quiet, hunched over his plate, using his fork to separate the potatoes from the beef so they wouldn't touch.  The reflection of the overhead lamp shined between the strands of his hopeful combover. 

"How was work today?" She already knew the answer.

"Tired." 

"That's not what I asked.  How was it at the shop today?"  She always asked this
question, not really wanting to hear the truth, hoping one day he would give her a big
smile and tell her that it was so busy he could hardly keep up.  But she had to ask,
anyway.  Or they would have sat there silent in their own worlds.

"It was okay, sweetie.  I'm just tired."

Ellen looked at him.  Head down, bags under his eyes, he had been lean and athletic, but a slump replaced the broadness of his shoulders and ennui had replaced his spirit.  Maybe the pudginess prevented him from feeling, from sensing.  His life seemed programmed, mind-achingly dull. Maybe he didn't remember who he used to be; maybe he didn't know who he was now.

Ellen shifted in her chair. The sound of the silverware on the glass table seemed louder and more irritating than usual.  The chimes on the sun porch were clanking.  She saw her reflection in the window.  The halo of the overhead light was not kind to her, either.

"I think I'm going to go on a photo shoot somewhere overseas.  Want to go with me?"  She watched his eyes for his response.  No change.  No spark.  She had seen this before.

"Where you going?" 

"I got my camera back from the repair shop today.  It was just some moisture under the lens.  I've got to get those shots of the frogs.  I heard pseudacris crucifer today, you know, the spring peepers.  They were in the pond by the Martins' farm.  Isn't that great?"  Her voice was lighter, hopeful, the bell-like peeping sounds were still echoing in her ears.

Dave knew about the frogs.  Ellen had been fascinated, no obsessed with them, since she was a child.  Her dad had taken her fishing and they had heard the great bull frog with its deep croak that sounded like the snapping of a large rubber band.  They had walked to the soggy edge of the lake to get a better look.  When she crouched down, the massive brown-green frog jumped from under a log and scared her literally out of her shoes.  She leaped with a squeal and a giggle into her daddy's arms leaving her favorite summer sandals stuck in the mud.  Since that day she had studied frogs, researched them and even more devotedly, had photographed them.

"I've got to go shoot them.  The Nat Geo nature photo contest deadline is in three weeks."  Her own impatience, almost desperation, pressed in her chest. "You know how badly I want to have a photograph published in National Geographic.  I've got to go." 

Dave lifted his head and leaned back in his chair.  He crossed his arms over his plump, full chest and looked at her with gentle eyes.  Ellen was well aware that he had heard all this before. 

"What is it about always wanting to go somewhere? You always want to travel, to be someplace else."    Not angry, not a demand, but more of a probing question, she could tell he was trying to understand, but also to make a point.

"Can't you just be content?  It seems like you are always looking."

Irritation flashed across Ellen's face, now flushed pink with wine.  She sat back, put her hands on her thighs, took a quick breath, then leaned urgently forward, staring hard at him.

"All who wander are not lost," she quipped.  "Don't you want to grow?  Don't you want to know more, to feed your brain, to think?!" 

In motion now, she rose quickly from the chair and paced around the kitchen, picking up dirty dishes and cleaning them furiously in the sink, but silent.  Her brow was furrowed and her chin tight against her chest.  The garbage disposal roared in the sink and the winds roared outside.

Dave watched for a while from the table, still leaning back in the chair, still calm, but at least engaged now. 

"Can't someone just be content? Can't someone just be happy with their life?" he responded patiently, with no hint of tension in his voice.

"How can you stand it, doing the same thing day in and day out?  How can you stand being in that same shop, looking at the same people, the same blank white walls?"  She wasn't yelling, but the pressure of her words was palpable.  "Aren't you concerned that you are fading away.  Don't you know about atrophy, about entropy?!"  She felt better somehow when she could make at least a slight reference to her love for science, even in a futile argument.

Dave looked at her with the calm understanding of years.  "I'm happy, that's all.  I don't analyze it.  I don't examine it.  I'm content.  I don't need to think about it."

"Ugh!" Ellen stomped off in disgust and frustration, leaving him at the table, turning her head from the mirror in the hallway as she passed.


The winds kept Ellen from sleeping; the window rattled insistently and she kept getting up, unsettling Thelma from her feet.  The hazy light of the moon fell on the bed and into Ellen's eyes.    Dave was insensate to all the activity.  He took his two Tylenol PM, turned his back to the moon, and curled up to the sandman.