This morning I woke up  remembering the bag of oranges you brought in yesterday.  Lying in bed staring up at the treetops I could see the clouds had come back after departing so dramatically yesterday in the afternoon, creating that beautiful space of clear air, blue sky and sunshine.

The clouds returned with their rare friend the fog; thick, dense and moody.

There is the familiar stirring in my belly. Why hate myself for this? Call it crazy if you want but I call it love. Frankly if I had more of it maybe I could do what I really want, bring it all inside of me and let it fill my bones and blood like breathing, so that I could truly grasp it, hold it, understand it.

A foggy damp morning in late October, a harbinger. And then the announcement:

“Say, I heard they’re closing out. Shuting it down, goin south HA! Get it? South for the winter.
 6!
 5!
 4!
 3!
 2!
 1!
Shutin it down!!!

Here it comes. Get your inner belly ready.

We are creeping toward the crystalline, the winter night, naked and dark, shiny and cold that puts us in our pajamas by 5 o’clock! But wakes us up deep in the darkness with the cry of the wolf, the moon itself howling in the black crystalline sky.

I went to the farmer’s market and bought pumpkins and those incredible orange squash and pulled up in the driveway, jumping out of the car practically dancing I opened the trunk and lifted the box filled with orange squash and pumpkin–heaving I carried it to the porch. You watching with one sleepy eye on me and the other on your ipad.

Standing over the box I could hardly speak. Thinking to myself, “I am such a rich person. I can buy a box of squash and pumpkins just because they called me by my name.”

Do you know that you didn’t even ask how much they cost?

I took them out one at a time. I placed one here, one there arranging, decorating the ledge of the old porch. I dashed out to the street to get perspective on my placement while you read the latest news and sipped your coffee.

There it was that day, too, that longing in my belly to take it all in, fill my veins, my heart, my bones and blood with the splendor of a whole box of orange–squash and pumpkin–he didn’t say a word about money–

but what you did say was, “speak to me only with thine eyes” what you did say with your eyes was this: “Tomorrow she'll be in the hammock all day watching leaves fall one by one. My kinda' crazy. She has in her belly the fire.”