It’s a “Jane Says” kind of day, with a Man Ray kind of sky.{1}

I found this in my drafts, and haven’t posted in a while, so here you go–from the vault, if you will.

It was the kind of dark out tonight that’s evening combined with thunderheads–dark gray and silver behind the trees–and it’s the summer, end of the term, so I was the only person out in this gloaming that shouldn’t be the gloaming.  It was still; I could hear my footsteps, and then the wind picked up and sent the leaves dry-skidding-scuttling across the sidewalk.  There was thunder off somewhere to the side; I heard a train whistle.

It was at this point I realized I was in a Ray Bradbury story.  Ray Bradbury if he were writing a southern gothic.  Ray Bradbury possessed by the ghost of William Faulkner: ^[2] The carnival is coming to town, but it doesn’t send you running; it doesn’t take your deepest dreams and twist them into malformed gifts.  No, the carnival coming is a comfort; the carnival people will look you over and see your grotesqueries and welcome you into their home.

I drove out of the parking lot with Leonard Cohen singing “Famous Blue Raincoat” in my speakers, passed the lake that was starting to chop, and watched the wind set the trees tossing.

It bothered me that the way home led toward actual 6pm sunlight.

¹ Not the SpongeBob villain–borrowing a line from “Feeling Gravitys Pull” by REM, there.  And “Jane Says” is my favorite Jane’s Addiction song.

^{2 [back]}Since Bradbury is dead, too, this is one hell of a possession!