Driving wind and the trenches

After a hard rain two days ago the sk cleared with a stiff wind that gusted and turned the skies clear and blue. I was waiting yet another day for payment from a customer who I had performed work for weeks ago whose story changes on a daily basis. Their excuses have become my entertainment. Never in all my years has anyone spun such yarns of personal troubles and reasons for being unable to pay. Always assuring me that tomorrow things will come together and I will be the first to be taken care of. "Taken" is the only word I am inclined to believe. To add to the drama they have hired me to work for them when they do get things strait, and always it is tomorrow. So, I have put off work for others. A bit of honesty on their part, or less gullibility on mine would go a long way to help the situation. As I said, the wind was blowing hard. The best use of my day was to blow up the world ball and walk Nice (the dog) against the wind that had turned the skies from gray to blue.

As we walked against the wind, and every step was a labor, I looked back to this summer when we walked beside roadways against the prevailing winds across the mid-west. I remembered days and weeks I spent laboring to get to the next town or mile marker, walking in the trenches and high grass, assuring myself the wind was not holding me back, but pacing me so I may be at a certain place at a certain moment to meet someone or see a sight that I would not have seen had the wind been calm. After having this thought while standing at an intersection, I looked up to see my customer driving by doing their best not to make eye contact. The excuse for this day would have found them on the expressway to file papers with the state. I smiled to myself, thanked the wind for the opportunity and resolved "to go back to the trenches" and take other work. I said this to myself in metaphor but within hours I was talking on the phone to a friend about other things when he offered the possibility of some work where we would fix a water flow problem around one of his customers' pool. Everyone has talents, trenches and flow are one of mine. I should be careful of what I say to myself about trenches...