I'm typing this from an old
blackberry phone, wifi tethered to
my actual phone. And I'm logged
into the republic on ssh, on an
Android app called Connectbot,
which this blackberry can run okay.
Through ssh I can use emacs on the
republic like I normally do. But
there is no meta alt key on this
connectbot, so I had to learn some
other ways of invoking my favorite
commands. That's kind of some
learning, I guess.

And I'm sitting on a rock near the
bank of a river where I'm living
these days. I remember this place.
I think the water is okay, but
there's sure more garbage than I
remember back in the day. There's
the usual trash bags and appliances
and mattresses like everywhere
else. But there's also this entire
delivery van on its roof what must
have slid off from the road above.
All the boxes are spilled out
across the gravel bar here. Most of
them aren't even opened. I guess
nobody comes around here much
nowadays. Probably also why the
driver's body is still strapped in
there, hanging upside down by its
seat belt. Looks a bit ripe by
now, now that summer's passed. If
no one ever finds them, Amazon
doesn't need to record it on their
seasonal fatality metric? I
remember having one of those jobs
back a ways. Got to hit your
quotas.

But anyways, I always like the
sound of running water, like in a
stream or river. And I like to
stand and watch and feel its
energy, and see how the water moves
around things, rocks and things.
Riffles and eddies. The subtle
rhythm under the ever
changing chaos of the flow. Its
constancy comforts me, knowing that
whenever I wander off from here to
do whatever it is I do, that water
will still be swarming against that
stone, all day and all night.

I remember my mother once telling
me of a time when I was just a tiny
baby, how I would gaze up
transfixed by the wind blowing
through her oak tree, staring at
every little leaf swinging and
turning at once, a million
directions. Running water is like
that too, to me.

I remember the first time I ever
saw the open ocean in its full
grandeur, with the wide open
beaches stretching for miles in
both directions beyond view, and
the waves coming in and out. And I
remember this feeling of fear I
had. The immensity of the ocean's
power and energy, the menace its
mindless coldness, and constancy.
That it could drag me out and
swallow me, kill me without knowing
or caring or even noticing, and its
sound and motion would never change
at all, not even for a moment. And
I seemed like a bug would seem to
me. It was very humbling in that
way.

To me, the sound and movement of a
stream or small river is like a
very small version of that. Just
enough of that energy and menace to
notice it, but not enough to have
me feel fear. Like a housecat to a
cougar. This here little river will
gurgle and flow around all this
ugliness and garbage and macabre,
and it won't care at all. It will
go up and down, flow in and out of
that log, and Amazon's truck, and
their skull, and it will keep doing
that long after its gone. And the
sound will be the same then as now.

Okay. Well, time to go home now I
guess.