Burned up

Note to self: Use the utensils provided instead of fingers to reposition hot items. Fingers, and hands, are important in your work and must not be damaged. See into insuring hands with Lloyds of London.

Instead of eating just some fruit and a banana (I already ate those), I decided to make a hot and hearty breakfast. I didn't run into problems until I decided to reposition the organic buckwheat pancake on the plate with my fingers, a pancake I had just taken out of a searing hot cast iron skillet. Even though I touched the pancake for no more than a fraction of a second, it was enough to burn off the first two layers of skin on two fingers on my left hand. I don't have any butter, so I reached for the lavender essential oil, which is what I use on all kinds of burns (including sunburns), and mentally kicked myself for being so impulsive and thoughtless. I actually use those fingers to type. Good thing I'm no stranger to pain and that I don't whimper and cry for more than a couple years or I'd be in a world of hurt. I have to work. Even if I took the time off, I wouldn't be able to type, so it's better to endure the pain and ignore the throbbing pulse in the tips of those two fingers. I've had it worse than this, so it's no big deal. At least it is nice and cool and rainy outside and the windows are open, so the rest of my body doesn't suffer as well.

Two days ago, I turned on the brand new ceiling fan in the bedroom for the first time. It felt so good night before last when I tossed and turned in the sweaty sheets. I had to turn it off yesterday because it was cool and wet and raining outside. I didn't need the breeze; there was plenty of breezy air coming through the open windows, so much I actually shut a couple of them.

We've had so much rain this year the leaves are exploding from the trees in all directions and I can no longer see my mountains through the frame of leaves on the squirrel porn tree. I can't even see the squirrel porn tree because there are so many leaves, so many big, lush, green, and thickly laced leaves. I catch flashes of movement, but nothing else, just the squeaks of pleasure/pain, and the occasional squirrel falling past the window when they get a little too rambunctious and one of them gets knocked out of the tree. I miss the mountains, especially since I get only an occasional glimpse when the wind whips the leaves into a flurry of green froth, but I have to be quick and not blink. Blinking is bad, and sometimes dangerous.

A couple of days ago, when it was hot and a quick sun shower only made the heat muggy and moist, I wished for rain . . . and here it is, for two days running. I hadn't lived here on this side of the Divide and so near the plains before now, but I do know that this amount of rain, such as we have had over the past 10 months, is unusual. I'm not complaining. I love the rain. I love the lower temperatures like a cool kiss on the fevered brow of relentless scorching summer, but I know this isn't the kind of weather common to this area. This is closer to the crisp cool of the mountains near the cabin when the summer sun reaches down with a molten brassy hand only to be cooled by the snow-touched winds sweeping the peaks so the heat is comfortable and not the searing scalded breath of the desert. I like this change from furnace heat to mountain cool the way it has been. I almost wish I had planted some vegetables and berries; they would be bearing fruit by now instead of struggling to survive and retain some moisture in this usually arid clime. There's still time unless this year, like last year, the snows come early.

Beanie said to send some rain her way and I'm doing my best, but my lungs just aren't what they used to be, especially since I'm spending so much more time breathing in and savoring the fragrance of growing green in this riot of flowers and trees. So much green makes the xeriscaped yards around here stand out in stark contrast. Yards covered with rocks and mulch, like littered forest floors, where a skinny twig of a maybe tree and silver green swords of desert grass look like an alien Martian island settled in the midst of all this lush richness, like a little respite for the eyes and a reminder that this, too, will pass as this rainy cycle turns back to the normal desert that sucks the sweat from a body almost before it forms. Everything changes and it should. Too much of the same thing makes me restless to move on and find another landscape to explore and get to know. For now, I'm happy here where the weather changes its mind as often as my sister Carol used to change her clothes.