Why It's So Pretty

"The sun doesn't really rise, honey," he explains. "It's actually the earth moving that makes it show out there on the horizon."

I know the earth moves, and the sun stays in one place. I am an intelligent person with a high school education and two years of community college.

Still, the term sunrise exists. When I say "watch the sunrise," I'm just using a figure of speech. You shouldn't have to watch every word you say.

I just sit and sip my coffee and nod. I have a lot to do today.

He continues, "So as the sun's light comes up, the little things floating in the air scatter it's light. Mostly the warm colors bouncing off these particles are what makes it so pretty."

And it really is pretty some days. A little light comes up from the bottom, and then it's like a light bulb makes a circle. The sky is gray, and the clouds get yellow and orangey around edges. There might be a little bit of pink, very high up. The sky gets gold. Then the sun is up, and it is another day.

So we just sit and watch, kind of peaceful. Anyway, this is one time of the day when we really are here together. Most of the time, yes, we are here. But we do kind of go our separate ways, doing the things that we do.

We bought this house where we live now more or less because we needed a place to live, fast. We had a buyer for our old house much quicker than we ever thought. The real estate lady said she was sure she could sell it fast, and she did.

I didn't really like this new house except for the kitchen window, which caught my eye right away. It's a bay window, unusual in kitchens. We put the kitchen table right in front of it. We sit here at the table with our coffee every morning and watch the sun.

He explains, and I listen.

As I mentioned, there wasn't much else about the house that I like that much. There are the stairs. You have to go up ten steps from the front door to the living room and kitchen. The bedrooms are eight steps down. He uses one of the bedrooms, the smallest one as an office. The inside door out to the garage, where the washer and dryer are, is off of the downstairs landing by the bedrooms.

This might not seem bad, but try going up and down those many stairs maybe fifty times a day. It can be a real pain. He doesn't have to go up and down as much as I do. Most of the time he is on the computer in his office. Sometimes he is down by the lake with Bernie, our dog, fooling around and doing whatever.

The house is on a lake.

Our old house, where we lived for forty-five years, was of course more than we needed without the girls and only Bernie, the one dog, left. It was a tremendous amount of work to keep up. Even with him retired, and home all day, the maintenance of the place was a lot. With an old house, something is always going wrong, needing fixing or attention of some kind.

We didn't even use some of the rooms there, but still you have to keep them up. It's my job to take care of the inside of the house. I do take pride in my home. Very few people do these days. Some people don't even iron their clothes. I for one can't just let things go.

My values about this kind of thing could just come from my genes. European people, at least so I have been told, take housekeeping seriously. Both of my parents, now deceased, were European immigrants. I had a home economics teacher in high school who I liked a lot. She said that if people regarded care of the home with more importance, maybe the divorce rate in this country would be lower.

I will always remember the man who came to fix our dishwasher in the old house. When he came in the front door, he kind of looked around and smiled. When he was working on the dishwasher, we chatted. He said that in some of the places he goes to, the roaches try to hitch a ride out with him. I laughed, of course.

When he left, he said he would be coming back for me. I laughed again, of course,

Now, if I ever see a roach, which can happen even in the cleanest of homes, I go on a cleaning and spraying spree. Roaches can happen anyplace with dampness, etc., but still.

So the real estate lady said she could find a buyer soon, and she was right. Before you knew what was happening, the old place was sold. The people wanted to move in as soon as they could so their kids could start school in the new place when school started.

The same real estate lady took us to our new, present house. I have to admit I liked the kitchen and the window. That's where I spend a lot of my time, so it matters. I just tried to overlook the stairs issue.

The house is right on a lake, which I did not care a bit about. But I thought he might like it. He did seem to be interested in the wooden dock going out the lake.

I mentioned the idea that he could get a small boat or fish. I forgot that he does not fish. He reminded me about this.

He went into a long story about when he was a little boy and his father took him fishing. He caught a fish and was so distraught that his father took the hook out and threw it back. Then he worried about the fish's tongue being hurt. His father told him that the water would heal it very quickly.

So we got this house. We go along here, day to day. He goes down by the lake a lot with Bernie and wanders around the dock. I have mentioned the boat idea several times again, but he doesn't say much.

He is probably thinking about it. His natural reaction to any idea of mine is to reject it, so we will just have to wait and see what happens.

A few times lately, I go down by the lake to look for him. I need to let him know that we will be eating soon. I find him puttering around the dock. Some ducks come around, and the last couple of times I have fed them bread. Ordinarily Bernie would have gone crazy over the ducks. Bernie is getting on in years now, and he just looks at them and goes back to sleep.

Well, tonight it's getting pretty dark. I have been busy with the house and not paying that much attention to his whereabouts. I think I better go out and see what he is up to now.

I can't find him down by the dock, and Bernie is nowhere around. This means that he is back in his office. He came back in while I was fixing supper. Bernie's supper is also ready.

A big, full, white moon is in the sky. The water on the lake is like glass, almost like a mirror. The white moon is making a reflection on the water. It is really pretty.

Now I could use him here.

He could explain why it's so pretty.