Winds of change

August had been cold and I'd already packed away my air conditioner for the winter. Predictably September served up a warm day and as I opened my bedroom window a dry breeze rustled through and I felt a sense of something unfullfilled and an odd hint of anticipation.

It took me by surprise. For eight years I'd raced from office to home and back, never allowing anything unexpected in my life. I chased the feeling, tried to pin it down but it faded and left only a vague restlessness. I went to my computer and tried to get back into coding but I wasn't able to focus.

I got up, wandered into my living room. Gold light filtered through the drapes and called me outside and I grabbed my keys, then threw them back to the table. I needed to walk.

The sun was too bright for my office accustomed eyes, and my feet instantly hurt. I hadn't done this in a very long time. I knew this feeling and didn't want it. I wanted control of my life.

Despite the pain my feet led me through a dense oak forest and out the far side. White butterflies twined round each other, momentarily lighting on purple blossoms then flitting back for another partnering.

The early fall sounds of insect whir and bird song didn't occupy my mind and again I searched for the source of my unrest. I didn't feel unhappy. I liked this monkish life, liked delving into the esetorica of algorithms and coding.

My path curved round and I popped out of a woods near the local grocery store. Following an impulse I went inside and bought a newspaper - Sunday, September 16th, 1990. I walked back to my house, threw the paper on the table and began paging through it, reading stories and finding nothing that addressed the odd feeling. I found the personals and started to read but immediately knew I was not even a little interested in a relationship and so I moved to the jobs section.

A couple of ads piqued my interest and I examined the feeling. I loved my current job but it left me with a lot of free time. Maybe I'd like having a second job? It would be nice to have a little extra money. I typed up a resume and a couple of cover letters and walked back to the grocery store to mail them.

The restless feeling was appeased a little but I still needed something so I bought supplies for a picnic and went back to the private little meadow. I sat and ate quietly, listening to the birds and watching the butterflies. Slowly I noticed the silence in my mind - no thoughts of code to write, no unhappy memories, no music playing. The butterflies floated closer, circling my head and a vagary of the breeze pushed one near enough that I felt a wing kiss my cheek.

Old thoughts of signs and fate bubbled below the surface and I abruptly gathered the remains of my lunch and marched back to my house. Only facts. Life is what it is. It's all explainable and all these feelings are just remnants of memory and poor perception.

Angrily I forced my attention back to the computer screen and slowly let the structure of the code seduce me. My mind flattened, the pleasure of pure thought triumphing over the welter of feeling.

Far out, beyond the horizon, the wind plotted my fate.