First blasty winds of winter scoop down today, shovelling leaves from trees, flattening the blades of grass to a green ocean, scattering the cornflowers.
Shoulds crowd my head. I should make rosehip jam. I should paint the spare bedroom.
Oh yeah, and deadline for first readership lineup of book looms ever closer. I should be editing, should be fixing that last chapter.
But I worry. Next door they are burn-clearing a hill. Smoke hangs like a pall over everything and then gets scooped up by the wind and filters through windows and doors and lurks, gasping, over the bay until the wind snarls it up again and throws it against distant houses.
What if?
I run to the post office to send back some library books. So I don't have to look at the flames licking the vast hill about 500 metres from my house. But I smell it even 5 km away.
Yeah, they ran hoses across my property as a precaution. I gave them permission for this. But the fire starters/carers are about 12 years old. How would they know anything about flame-killing if the trees catch? Or maybe it will leap across the grass over the fence and on to my house?
Anxieties.
Now unfounded.
Day is done.
The winds are intense and noisy but warm.
I will take the dog for a walk along the shore. As is our wont at this time of day. I love watching the waves pound up the cliff on the other side of the bay and then fall back exhausted.
Much like me.
Worrying about nothing knocks me right out.
