"It's funny how the language we use and even the voice we use changes."
"You mean you think that's not normal?" The drizzle had grown to a steady rain, not a mist but a pour. Sophie cinched the ties to her hood. The Anna hovered an arm's length away.
"The different languages we use to speak with different people, or the way my own voice changes when I catch myself as stiff as stale bread and trip on my rigidity, embarrassed at my bossiness." Sophie Lei Maku'e was the older sister. She missed her brother and thought of him at moments that slipped between the cracks of her usually controlled environment. A laugh cackled from her bent rib cage. Oh how she missed the Pidgin that would spill from her because Kawika was on the other end of the line.
"No, I see what you're questioning. Who speaks in a constant monotone?"
Sophie kept walking out the long winding driveway to the edge of the woods where the clear cut had emptied the forest of trees. A commodity of trees, a cash crop. That was odd: trees grown as a commodity. Strange, the way we made up words to fit our crooked thinking. "A raw material that can be bought or sold. Like coffee or copper; or trees."
"I'm reading a book about tea. It's called Liquid Jade. Do you know what books are, do you know what tea is? " The Anna was no where in sight. She had found a limb of Cedar and perched her short legs under cover but had heard Sophie's questions. The bird simply stilled, then shook her head at a dizzying speed to dry herself. The woman walked. The rain fell.
Images and memories of printed words from the book about tea kept Sophie company as she walked. There was room, plenty of it, between her steps. Ritual tea. First in China. Did her Ancestors of the long long past pick the leaves or trade them? Why did her family have to be involved in the books she read? Puddles of rain were already collecting her boots splashed rather than avoided them. There. Splashing in puddles --that action-- Sophie shifted, if there was a voice it would be gleeful. The Anna met her at the head of the driveway. "We had a home in the trees that lived out there. The clearing of many trees at one time is odd, but not funny. I think the word commodity makes for a lot of too muches. Follow me!"
The rain was softening, the cell of dark Pig Clouds had raced north. Sophie lifted her hood to keep up with the Anna's flight plan. The bird had back pedaled to a mound of slash left by the loggers. Seedlings were up to knee height. Douglas Fir was the commodity tree of choice. A one tree forest was odd, as in not nature's way. The owner of this land was into growing trees for money. "It will be a long time before birds will nest here again. Ground dwellers move in quickly. Ants. Beetles. They don't hesitate. Spider will make her appearance too."
"What can we do. I mean, what can I do about this messy thinking going on?"
"I say," the Anna moved to within inches of Sophie Lei's hood. "just keep feeding me those thoughts of yours. They keep me fed with the calories I need, and there's something within me that sorts the ... uncertainties. Then we have times like these. We become connected. It makes a great difference. A small differences perhaps. But then it builds."
These conversations lasted moments, a string of moments at the most a handful of minutes. Sophie wondered whether they really happened.
There's more here.
"You mean you think that's not normal?" The drizzle had grown to a steady rain, not a mist but a pour. Sophie cinched the ties to her hood. The Anna hovered an arm's length away.
"The different languages we use to speak with different people, or the way my own voice changes when I catch myself as stiff as stale bread and trip on my rigidity, embarrassed at my bossiness." Sophie Lei Maku'e was the older sister. She missed her brother and thought of him at moments that slipped between the cracks of her usually controlled environment. A laugh cackled from her bent rib cage. Oh how she missed the Pidgin that would spill from her because Kawika was on the other end of the line.
"No, I see what you're questioning. Who speaks in a constant monotone?"
Sophie kept walking out the long winding driveway to the edge of the woods where the clear cut had emptied the forest of trees. A commodity of trees, a cash crop. That was odd: trees grown as a commodity. Strange, the way we made up words to fit our crooked thinking. "A raw material that can be bought or sold. Like coffee or copper; or trees."
"I'm reading a book about tea. It's called Liquid Jade. Do you know what books are, do you know what tea is? " The Anna was no where in sight. She had found a limb of Cedar and perched her short legs under cover but had heard Sophie's questions. The bird simply stilled, then shook her head at a dizzying speed to dry herself. The woman walked. The rain fell.
Images and memories of printed words from the book about tea kept Sophie company as she walked. There was room, plenty of it, between her steps. Ritual tea. First in China. Did her Ancestors of the long long past pick the leaves or trade them? Why did her family have to be involved in the books she read? Puddles of rain were already collecting her boots splashed rather than avoided them. There. Splashing in puddles --that action-- Sophie shifted, if there was a voice it would be gleeful. The Anna met her at the head of the driveway. "We had a home in the trees that lived out there. The clearing of many trees at one time is odd, but not funny. I think the word commodity makes for a lot of too muches. Follow me!"
The rain was softening, the cell of dark Pig Clouds had raced north. Sophie lifted her hood to keep up with the Anna's flight plan. The bird had back pedaled to a mound of slash left by the loggers. Seedlings were up to knee height. Douglas Fir was the commodity tree of choice. A one tree forest was odd, as in not nature's way. The owner of this land was into growing trees for money. "It will be a long time before birds will nest here again. Ground dwellers move in quickly. Ants. Beetles. They don't hesitate. Spider will make her appearance too."
"What can we do. I mean, what can I do about this messy thinking going on?"
"I say," the Anna moved to within inches of Sophie Lei's hood. "just keep feeding me those thoughts of yours. They keep me fed with the calories I need, and there's something within me that sorts the ... uncertainties. Then we have times like these. We become connected. It makes a great difference. A small differences perhaps. But then it builds."
These conversations lasted moments, a string of moments at the most a handful of minutes. Sophie wondered whether they really happened.
There's more here.
No comments:
Post a Comment