Summer Night

It's a nice night, one of those ones people in Florida would kill for now. Low humidity and a breeze. It makes you feel like you should go out on the porch (if only I had a porch), rock in the rocking chair (if only mosquitoes didn't exist), and talk with a close friend until one in the morning (if only I had someone around to talk to). As it is, I must settle for watching the fireflies blink lazily in the forest, catch whiffs of burnt trash smoke on the wind, and watch the neighbor's cat wade through the crabgrass, an almost rebellious hint of the wild in the suburban paradise, past the moss-stricken shed and the unpruned rosebushes running wild. The front window offers a slightly less appetizing view of my weeds, asphalt, and the person across the street's chemically Day-Glo green yard. Close your eyes and you'll hear the faint buzz of a million insects, almost timid venturing of the occasional chirp from one brave soul of a cricket, the endless zzzt-SNAP-zzzzt-SNAP-crackle-SNAP-POP-zzzt of the same bugs I mentioned before meeting their demise in the anything-remotely-like-an-insect-hating neighbor's humongous bright blue neon bug barbecue, and under it all the faint roar of traffic eternally passing through the somewhat-distant highway, like water through a river.