Quickening

I actually did write my five-minute on Friday this time, but it was too beautiful out to go in and type it out. So I'm linking up with Lisa-Jo on Saturday again, and nursing my first sunburn of the year - I did, in fact, go in to fetch sunscreen, I just didn't get any on myself. That thing about moms and oxygen masks? It counts for skin health too. May my lobster shoulders be enough lesson for the rest of the summer.

This week's prompt is "close."

Life took me to the river several times this week. Up and down the folds of ravines, across bridges bafflingly far apart, winding close to the lifeblood of the land. Such cross-city journeys usually leave me banging my head against my roadmap: steep inclines, brush, and rugged terrain makes the trip from A to B a twenty minute meander via X, F, and J. The detours became a treat, however, rather than a trial, when it meant witnessing a valley come alive. The green crept up daily from forest floor to canopy, the birches leading the fray and the elms lagging behind. The brush seemed richer with every day's trek, the emeralds and limes enhancing from pin pricks to haze to full-on saturation of unfurled life.

I forget about our urban microclimats from my north-west vantage. The river's gifts come a little quicker than the prairie water table's. What a joy to witness the quickening up close.

That it's for this week. Do follow the link above to Lisa-Jo Baker's site to see the five-minute masterpieces from many a brave soul, unedited and unashamed.