It is a languid summer day. The kind to rejoice! And Saturday! Blue sky between mixed folds of fluffy white and greyish clouds, a faint breeze and dazzling sunshine. The torrents of rain over the past several days – still wet in small places upon the roads and unseen upon the glass patio table in the garden – have swathed the entire carpet of the county in a luxurious and humming green. Bees are buzzing; birds are chirping; flowers have blossomed. The heat from the yellow sunshine is remarkable. The summer solstice is at hand! Life in the northern hemisphere is once again on the move!
On the other side of town – where I ventured to satisfy my curiosity of the progress of construction of architect Peter Mansfield’s new apartment building – there were canoes on the river. In the nearby riparian parkland athletic types clad in lycra were about to commence a standing paddle on flotation boards. Still others less adventurously and secluded among the bullrushes positioned themselves along the shoreline, feet cooling in the water, tranquilly absorbing the welcome solar rays.
After accomplishing our morning bicycle purge along the erstwhile B&O railway line, past the Old Town Hall and across the bridge over the silent river mirroring itself upriver like a glass ribbon towards the Village of Appleton, and after completing my generally sinful nutrition of Roquefort cheese and other unmentionable fat to complement the apple slices and steel cut oats bathed in kéfir, I launched my chrysalis of mechanical ingenuity upon the Appleton Side Road.
Still within hearing of the Main Street traffic, but pointed onto the country road past verdant farms and happy horses, I accelerated to speed then opened the car windows and landau roof. I was content!
A-tisket, a-tasket
A brown and yellow basket
I sent a letter to my mommy
On the way I dropped it
I dropped it, I dropped it
Yes, on the way I dropped it
A little girlie picked it up
And put it in her pocket
Songwriters: Ella Fitzgerald / Van Alexander
A-Tisket, A-Tasket lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC