Today is my last night sitting on the front porch. It has been a fleeting summer day. Nothing has lasted long. Even the weather has come and gone ephemerally. The rain is a soft drizzle; steam is collecting on the sidewalks and driveway. I am thinking about myself. Who doesn't have regrets or leaves behind half-lived notions of grandeur. I wave goodbye to my sister as she walks briskly to her car, eager to return home and get out of the rain. A few solitary mosquitos buzz covertly near my ears and occassionally one bits my leg. The sound of the rain is primordial. Its scent beckons the smell of first rains. It is an earthly and richly organic smell. Everything is more fantastical when it is wet. The trees seem more green, though I know tomorrow morning they will be as green as my final evening sitting here. Sadie licks my leg and returns to her business, which is scratching behind her ear as if to say "You could be doing this for me". Her moppish Boykin Spaniel curls are so beautiful against the natural wood of the porch. Then it all stops. Elizabeth Anne has read into her instinctive hints. She kisses Sadie. Sadie rolls over, victim to ten year old cuteness. Elizabeth Anne has a recorder. She is playing nymphlike. I imaginer her as an elf in the traveling company of Tatiana. Her Shakespearean costume dwarfing her petite frame as she trumpets ahead of the fairy caravan. But this is not Stratford upon Avon. I am sitting on my porch watching the rain. I hope this moment stays with me when I am feeling lonely and the sun refuses to shine and I am away from my cozy memory of tonight.