happiness

walked old haunts gathering splendid windfalls

followed trails and found amusing and useful treasure

went to favourite caff for a sit down

and because it has nice big tables where you can spread out and do stuff

made bundles while sipping at africanos

had amusing conversations with other patrons

then

a guitarist wanders in, gets coffee, begins to warm up his guitar

minutes later he is joined by friend with ukelele

[i twitch, not, in general, being enamoured of ukelele]

the two begin to play

and it is like heaven

their repertoire is B I G

mostly they play swing with a haunting gypsy lilt to it

presently the ukelele player takes the lead

improvises exquisitely on Gershwin's "embraceable you"

the woman working on her laptop to my left

begins to sing sotto voce

i wish she would sing louder

she has the voice of an angel

my inner hyperactive mutters about spending time indoors

when outside there are things to be done

i tell the inner voice to be quiet and stay listening

they play for an hour and a bit

i take another walk

much later

at sunset

i sit in a favourite spot 

out of the wind on those lovely steps in the aquatic park

and make more bundles

somewhere up behind me

someone begins to blow a tenor sax

very, very beautifully.

my cup runneth over 

and then when i think it really doesn't get much better than this

i find a heart

in San Francisco

if you lost one*, let me know

[or just sing it in the shower]

*like this one, i mean

[i hung it on a glass for the snap...was too dark in the park]