Candlelight Within, Magnolias Without

January 8, 2005

While living in the LA area our rooms were on the second story of the house. When you looked out the windows, our sight line was in the center of a wooded canopy. The large waxy magnolia leaves would reflect the shifting patterns of light and the vast quantity of diminutive oak leaves would shimmer like green sequins when touched by the coastal breezes and Santa Ana winds. To wake up in the warm California morning amidst the tree tops was a delight that I won't forget, and I greatly miss the sound of the leaves rustling about just outside our balcony patio door.

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Now I wake to the sound of air-braking trucks on the highway that runs along a small hill top outside our front door. It isn't all that bleak, as I can often trick myself into thinking that the persistent hum of traffic is the flow of a river (which, metaphorically, I suppose it is), but it has none of the sensory charm that our oak grove bower held, and I look forward to the day when the sound of birds rustles me from sleep more frequently than the sound of horns.