on sky and cake

The thing about the sky this evening is that it is thin and palest blue tinged with yellow-white off toward the western edge of the valley, capped by a heavy helmet of thick pewter cloud cover. I know the sun is behind this expanse of opaque grey, or rather I trust that it is, because the plainly drawn line that edges the clouds is frightfully aglow, a rim of golden shining that fades and feathers into the blue behind and--to my eyes--below it. All this sky drama unfolds behind a foreground of evergreens in the green space behind our building, their piny branches upward-reaching and full of birds. The wind is mostly still.

I am feeling energetic, probably due to the caffeine in my not-small piece of chocolate cake, and due to my two-mile ramble to and from the grocery store. At the store, I bought a five-pound bag of organic carrots, four large Idaho potatoes, a 99-cent bag of delicious little cucumbers without pesticides or waxes, a block of kosher cheddar, heads of lettuce and a bunch of green onions. Josh has requested potato soup for tomorrow night's dinner, and I will add spinach to it, and salad on the side. My shoulders ache from the carrying of these root vegetables and other bits of good in a backpack on the way home. I kept an eye out for black bears stealing apples in people's yards, but it was the middle of the day. The only interesting wildlife I saw was a college student on a bicycle who sped past me in the street and did some pretty amazing swooping from side to side.

Tonight I am reading African women's theology and thinking about what it means for me, in my cultural location, to read and learn from African women's theology and to write about it in my dissertation. I am also thinking about my philosophy of teaching, my commitment as a professor of literature and writing to helping students develop practices that matter in their whole lives, not just the classroom. College isn't just for getting a slip of paper to get a job to get money to get whatever else one wants, is it? I feel we have to put a lot of effort into resisting this way of thinking.

The slight wind has shifted the thick space of cloud, and the sun is insistent, shining on the side of my face and casting my shadow on the bright wall across the room. It's too bright to look out the window, but looking over at the wall I see a strengthening light. Funny, the way the sun shines so insistently, even more insistently, in the hour before it dips behind the western mountain range. That last glowing always seems to glow best.