"Will you be my friend?"

I layed belly to the sky, toes draped lazily over the edge of the yellow vinyl raft, fingers air drumming in the water....drifting....in circles. I never opened my eyes, pretending to know when the clouds passed and exactly how they were shaped by the heat on my eyelids.....rubber stamps of sunshine in the cool negative shape of angels, elephants on their hind legs, horses with wings.....

I listened to the wind. To the trinkets in the sky. The natty faded towels on the clothesline; a sudden parade of American Flags....exactly the same size, the same color, as my kindegarten year.....hand over my heart ....the fabric billowing, the chain clanking hauntingly against the pole. Squirrels, or rats maybe, I don't know, ratatatted back and forth across the crooked fence line, racing madly to nowhere. There was traffic in the distance, and then close. Boom boxes rattling. Gears shifting. A siren. Still, I didn't open my eyes. This was my peace. And I was gonna live it.....

I don't remember dreaming. I don't remember the 45 minutes I disappeared from earth forever.

But I remembered how I got there. Comfy cozy in the lazy round river. Waiting on the boys. Floating round and round and round....saying thank you......