From the north to the west, jack-hazard flashes of lightning suddenly illuminated the sky. The countdown to thunder suggested that the thunder cell was just a few miles away. Pretty damn close for not having announced itself without an earlier warning. A minute or two passed as both nfp and Rumi discussed the turn in weather prospects. Then another, brighter flash slashed across the northern post-dusk vista. The storm seemed to be whipping up somewhere off of
“I think we’d better seek some cover,” suggested Rumi.
nfp concurred. Although he didn’t mind running in the cemetery rain, rain could prove very harmful to his laptop and the other cybertoys which included a second “server” laptop, webcam, digital camera, and portable webrouter that he was currently hauling around in his ever-loyal companion backpack. . Besides, he figured, a soggy Rumi may prove less engaging and fun to be around. So he started to pack up his previously-deployed gear (laptop and an unopened beer) while Rumi signaled to her dog
“Wither us?” deferred Rumi. nfp was figuring that there were a few covered mausoleums close by that could provide shelter. The key was to quickly assess the precise direction of the storm and then choose the mausoleum that provided the best leeward protection against the growing likelihood of a dampening onslaught. Yet soon enough, from the north-northwest, came a sudden gust heralding the storm at hand. To nfp, that meant that the fairly nearby Dreamland Mausoleum with its south-facing overhang would provide the optimum available protection.
Nick of time. Now there’s a hackneyed expression for you. Although “there’s a hackneyed expression for you” is probably hackneyed itself. In any case, both Rumi and nfp had good knees and above average stamina and neither got nicked or hacked by the assortment of landscaped shrubbery they glided though as they took a direct path south to the tomb extolled as 'Dreamland'. As they arrived at the shelter and scurried under the cover of its south overhang, nfp reflected upon how much he used the environs and amenities of the cemetery for the furtherance of his vital life interests, while others viewed the grounds only as a repository for the dead. Over the past several years, he had run over 2,500 miles around various cemetery loops, taken thousands of photos—many of which he put to his blog, and written hundreds of blogs—perhaps half of them poems—that he had published in cemetario using his laptop and a satellite hook-up. He had made some acquaintances along the way, also. He knew all the guards, as they knew him by name. Had encountered other artists—painters and photographers mostly—drawn to the amazing arboretum-quality of the rolling landscape and the majestic monuments erected as tributes therein. And had met hundreds of other surprised people who had just happened to wander to the perch atop the hill by the Wade obelisk where he traditionally sat blogging like a madman while consuming copious amounts of backpacked beer.
“There’s a different energy here,” observed Rumi, contrasting their newly assumed position under the auspice of the Dreamland Mausoleum with the lean-against-an-old-tombstone perch-upon-a-hill carefreeness from which they had just fled.
Even as the storm viciously assaulted the north face of the mausoleum with drubbing winds and horizontally-driven rain, nfp understood that Rumi was not referring to the weather. “Yes, different,” he agreed. “I have found that there’s always a certain morbid ominousness to such considerable, and obviously lavish, structures, as this, constructed to house the dead. Except perhaps for the Great Pyramids and the Taj Majal. Yet I’ve never personally visited them, so perhaps they would not be exceptions, if I visited them, after all.” And he continued, “I do so much prefer the Sun and a good breeze in dalliance under open air; the view from the un-sheltered hillside while watching the sunset over lake Erie on a solemn summer eve; the ever-remixing buzz of the sexually-driven, the soulfully-driven, and even the hodgepodge assortment of the inexplicably-driven creatures-all just venturing forth in a spirit of laissez-faire—whether they be humans meandering, dragonflies propelling, birds soaring, or alien spacecraft flying overhead—than I do a deeply shaded-shelter, seemingly damp even during drought times, such as this where we now find us meteorologically-challenged but otherwise unbefuddled.”
“That last sentence of yours is so amazing,” exclaimed Rumi. “Do you often outburst in such a stream-of-consciousness tongue-of-profundity?”
“Never,” replied nfp. “When I speak, I just speak street-talk. All the time. And street-wise, at that. That last sentence—that’s how I write.”
“So, in that case…you must be writing now ,” reasoned Rumi, in a quixotic reflection, and with a smile, approximating an intimation to perfection.
—this is the sixth chapter of notforprophet’s ghost-written book—
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