The Time to Prepare Jennifer Liss
T
here are things in nature that engender an awful quiet in the heart of man.” -N. Scott Momaday
You lean back on your elbows under an ancient oak. Below you, the 101 snakes north. Just west of the highway is the beginning of the entire Pacific Ocean, inky in the end-of-night light. You’ve been stoned for hours, maybe days. You swam in the warm bioluminescent sea, rode your bike up the hill. What do you know? Hard to say. You’re just thinking about yourself and the other barefoot kids you run around with in your coastal town. You aren’t thinking about the hills and the
50
