The Joy of Rambling

^{Ode To Charlie}

It’s a small pool, but it’s lovely. 

It’s a fading sun but it warms me still. 

I sit in my small, gray, plastic, surprisingly comfortable chair and watch the blue water shimmer and swirl, shimmer and swirl. It creates its own rhythm in time with the intake and return valves that work in tandem with the filter. All of this technology and machinery at work to maintain the pristine, enchanting view I have before me. 

The roars of high school baseball enthusiasts reach me. They respond to a bellowing voice with a bullhorn shouting unintelligible exhortations. The chaotic clamor shifts in and out with the breeze as it rolls across open spaces to my backyard.

The early spring sun is sinking rapidly, and I fear the warmth’s departure will end my moment of reflection. Either that or the moment will be stolen when I’m forced to get up and put my dog in the house thanks to his incessant barking.

I call out every few minutes, “Hey!” “Charlie!” “Stop!” … and other such commands that he neither understands nor cares to interpret. It is in the God-given nature of this beast to vociferously react to a leaf that has the audacity to twirl across his path. This curious, flying object finally makes its descent to the hard, cold concrete that surrounds the pool. Charlie races to it, gives it a sniff, and moves on.

This concrete, that only hours earlier enjoyed baking under golden rays, has succumbed to the shade of the maple tree that shields it from possible heat exhaustion. The nerve of that tree assuming this is what the concrete wants! 

And, at this thought, I realize that my neighbor’s two-story house is doing the same thing to me … threatening my source of light and warmth and causing small bumps to rise quietly on my exposed arms. 

Oh, that the day would last forever and the sun would never set. I would sit in this chair indefinitely, rising only to address the intrusion of my human needs. (Why is it always hunger, sleep or a full bladder that seem to inevitably interrupt the most glorious moments?)

I realize at once, that I’m experiencing a fleeting taste of Heaven, and I’m ready to bask as long as the rooftops allow. This momentary glimpse, this tease, actually, sets my sights on a hope of a life to come: Eternity. It also reminds me that I must wait what seems like (and actually is), a lifetime to fully engage in its peace. In that place there will be no interruptions. No rooftops, barking Charlies or calls of nature. 

But now I am cold. The moment has passed. The ball players have gone home to dinner, one team victorious, the other sullen. And I must yield to the reality of a setting sun and life on this broken earth. 

Charlie looks at me and tilts his head. “Come on boy. It’s time to go inside.”

Charles of Barles Gallagher

(Aliases: Charley Barley, Char-Char, Mr. Barles)

8/1/2008 – 12/27/2022