What I saw Today

 I got out early today as there are heat warnings up across the Pacific Northwest. Temps over 100 degrees are predicted. (Remember not many houses have AC.) I rode my bike along the Willamette River bike path.

I saw—

A man sitting in the midst a gaggle of white geese along the shore

A woman eating blackberries straight from the bush.

I stopped at a bush where last year Grace and I feasted on berries, and where she claims she got a rash. Today the berries though black were not plump, coated in dust and cobwebby. We haven’t had rain since the second week in June. The grass is brown and the river slugs along, much lower than years past. A haze hangs in the sky, perhaps, affected by the myriad of fires burning in the south and northern California. 

Stopping, even for a second, I am drenched in sweat.