Mysteries often solve themselves by finding you.

I awoke one morning to greet an endless array of gray puffs and a barely-there atmosphere peeking between every crevice the puffs would allow it.

It yearned to be seen and appreciated. But today, the stage belonged to the puffs. Still, the sky remained a middle child, aching for love.

The puffs sent a misty drizzle down to the soil and I thought of the bugs getting drowned out by the puffs’ lightest touch. Ants are resilient. They are quite strong, are they not? As are the spiders, the caterpillars, the worms, and the bees. Their ancestors have prepared them for this very moment.

Miniature streams of tears formed upon the ducts of the earth and found themselves gradually spilling up and over and down its cheeks.

I watched her cry and enjoyed it. She is beautiful when she cries.

I stepped foot onto her body with gentle elegance. Her untamed grass stemmed around my rain boots as I crushed a section below. I left little indents as I moved ahead.

I had no destination this morning. I felt called to leave my shed on the knoll. Something pulled me out of the door and into the rain.

The teardrops felt like tiny kisses upon my uncovered hands and head.

_I love you, too, _I thought.

I felt a smile perch across her face.

I roamed the grounds for an hour with an estimate of the direction I could be in. If the puffs had disappated, I’d know the time and the direction I was going. I had trust that the atmosphere would soon receive a moment to shine among her parents.

Then I saw a mound. A grassy mound straight ahead. I wanted to see the view atop it. I wanted to lay atop the hill with a shower of kisses along my body. This is what I wanted.

I felt myself glide to the mound. This is why I left the shed this morning. I was called to this hill. There was something special. I couldn’t place it. Perhaps I should rebuild my shed here. I grinned at the thought and quickened the pace.

Reaching the initial incline of the hill, I began to climb, the hairs of the earth gently slipping beneath my heels with mice-like squeaks and squelches.

The hill wasn’t a large one but the urge picked and prodded at the strings in my chest. Something wanted me here and I wanted it just as desperately.

Up and up, squelch after squelch, the summit was conquered. I breathed a sigh as I took in the surroundings.

I hadn’t noticed the drizzle had turned to a light mist. Tinier kisses laid themselves along my cheeks. They kissed my lips and teeth and the joy rised through my core and up and out of my body.

This is the place I needed to be today. I sat in the wet grass and felt it all.

The sun peered out between the puffs and left ethereal streaks across the smaller mounds surrounding me. The drizzle soon cleared.

If only I had brought my paints. I wish to lay here forever. At least a painting would allow a small glimpse of the view. But it would never recapture the air. I wished I brought a jar to collect it in to breathe on a special occasion. Yet what occasion would allow such grandiosity? I pondered the thought and concluded that nothing would be deserving enough to open the jar. I was glad I didn’t have one. The urge to resist the turn of the lid would reside forever in me. What a purgatory!

I breathed deep as the grass slowly shook itself from dew. My clothes dried and felt as if I had been frozen to the soil. This was everlasting peace. I could die here.

The air must have drugged me into a tender sleep. The land around me had completely dried. The puffs evaporated. I felt rejuvenated.

Sitting up, I saw a puff in the distance. Not the gray ones in the sky, but one that lived on the ground and glowed a royal violet shade with specks of light reflecting .

I jerked my head around in search of the culprit, but no one outside of myself witnessed the glimmering smoke signal.