RUSHES

When freewheeling down the mountain on clear cool Spring mornings like this, I am rolling through a broad and accelerating river of warm air rising from the Lake as the sun begins to warm the mountainside. The tide of air is a rush of fragrances from the fields, the village and the lake below, a potpourri of tilled earth, new rice, lake water, garden flowers and morning coffee, countless other scents all mingling together that the nose knows but the mind can't rightly find, though it enjoys them all the same... Yes I know that scent, what is it -- It's gone, it was -- Now this scent I know; this is... There are some herbs in there, fishing boats and breakfasts, the wild and the civilized blending with the living scent of the Lake, rising toward the mountain summits and thence into the heavens, I down here descending through it all, head back, breathing in the gift...

Then when I come home at night and am wheeling up, the darkling sky is pouring down the mountainside as the land cools and the air above the daywarmed Lake is beginning to rise, pulling the mountain air down in the great daynight backforth that betides this time of year, but this cascade is a rush of scents entirely wild, a bouquet rich with the tang of cedar and pine, whole mountainside forests of sundrawn tree breath, blended with the essence of tumbling streams and the spice of native herbs, the wildflowers that work at night sending out their subtle musks on the moist air as I rise through it all, breathing deep with discovery...

Either way, it's real wealth.