A. Scott white

The sky billows in blurry grey. The wind moves and stops, sprinting around tall buildings and then resting, wandering sidewalks, gathering short-lived resolve, bursting across streets and then rethinking. Here and there leaves and papers dance in the indecision. The soil in the concrete flower boxes, like the grass and the pavement, is wet with dew or recent drizzling rain. The air is cool, with patches of cold. The sun is more an influence than a presence, the daytime more a suggestion than a decision. The naked branches sway like wooden grass, like new dancers who have not yet learned the rhythm to stay together. Birds are scattered here or there, walking the wet pavement, not flying above, hopping alone, not in groups, glancing furtively around and feeling a bit out of context. People walk by, alone or in couples, but not talking. Some move quickly, missing the sun. Some stroll slowly, loving the day, watching it all, feeling alive.

We are the people of the grey. We dream of London streets on cool, foggy mornings, or the coffee shops of Seattle, or the campfire when you can see your breath as clearly as the woody smoke. We wear wool flat caps and jackets, flannel shirts and scarves, warm boots and gloves. We are Tolkein in tweed smoking his pipe; we are characters from a Jack London novel. We spend the summer in hiding, coming out only at night. We bloom in the winter, petals of grey and black, wool and down and cotton.

I am one of these, and I feel reborn today. Sitting at a sidewalk table downtown, having sipped only steaming hot coffee, I am intoxicated and I remember what I forgot long ago: anything is possible, even magic. The grey cold reminds me of this, for reasons I cannot describe. Maybe because every breath looks like a spirit, escaping the body and dissolving into the world around. Maybe it is the orange and black of Halloween draped across the city. The late fall and winter make it seem possible that there are more things in this world than meet the eye. There is a spirit in every shadow, faeries and ghosts, gnomes and elves and familiars. There are gods and heroes from myths and legends. There is good and evil in all of us, and a million stories to explain them, and a million rituals to keep them in check. There are Druids far across the ocean, through the trees, fading in and out of the early morning fog. There are fires burning, carrying incense and offerings heavenward past shrines, totems and steeples. There are a million different unclear ideas of good and evil, a million different versions of black and white, rising with the spirits and smoke into the heavens.

The sky billows in blurry grey.