Jim's quiet musings . . .

It's two p.m.....time to take my pill.

Peter says my dreams are coming from the pills. How the hell do they get those dreams in there?

Gotta get to the town dump before it closes.............not much happening at the dump today and nothing much in the "good stuff" pile. I don't think I could ever live in a big city anymore, I'd miss the little perks of living out in the country. You know you're a resident when the dump guy knows your name and lets you in whether you've got a sticker or not.

The thunderstorms are on their way. The clouds are dark to the northwest and you can see the underside of the leaves. I love thunderstorms.

I finally changed the catbox. Funny thing about that little devise....if you leave it alone long enough without emptying it, the stench will eventually remind you that it's time to dump it out and put clean litter in there. Funny how such a small damn cat can generate such a terrible stink. She'll be right in there the minute I put fresh litter in the thing, whether she's gotta go or not, it seems to be a rite of passage or something for her....gotta initiate the damn thing or some such deal.

Fireflies. Leave it to Shirl to always end up coming up with a subject that gets my though processes going. ...

When I was growing up in El Paso, Texas I don't remember fireflies. My mom used to say the lit-up bugs in the way of the beam of light from the projector at the drive-in theatre was fireflies but I eventually found out they were just moths. The first firefly I saw was in Glencliff, New Hampshire.

My wife and I were staying at her father's cabin in Glencliff. I was outside, probably trying to avoid her father who after a few beers would always get like my old man used to.....mean as hell. I saw a firefly and there was no mistaking it. I ran inside and grabbed a mason jar and ran back outside to trap it. Once I had it, I began to look around for more of them and low and behold, when I looked up, I saw literally hundreds of them.

My father-in-law the jerk ended up poking fun at me but I didn't care. I just told him to shove it up his butt where no fireflies could be seen and continued on to enjoy the light show. Pity that some people never learn to appreciate the simpler things in life. He was such a miserable man. I guess I was all of about twenty-nine or thirty years old then.

I watched those fireflies that night until I was one big mosquito bite. Blinking on and off, on and off, on and off, well into the night. Some of them landed on me and I could see them up close, their luminescence bright enough to see the material of my pants. Like little live lanterns. They never fail to amaze me even now when I occasionally see one fly up close to the bedroom screen while I'm lying in bed.

-Jeeem-