We make the trip to and from Takamatsu about once a week for groceries, a bowl of udon, and a bike ride around a place that’s not a small island. The last ferry home to Megijima leaves the city at 6:10pm, and the 20 minute boat ride changes every time, as the skies get darker, the air gets cooler, and storms and clouds come and go. Heading into fall in these parts is remarkably different from where I grew up, with the most intense mix of weather.
One day it’s calm and cool and feels like we’re living on a lake, the next day the wind is blowing down trees and whipping waves up onto your front yard as rains are drenching hillsides, falling into the narrow streets beside the sea. One night, there were a series of flashes on one side of the window where we sleep, and I thought “gosh, it must be an alien spaceship,” but slowly the sounds came with it and I realized is was just rapid lightning every few seconds that filled the sky and soon shook our little room.
Then, there are the results of the harsh weather as color sprouts from buds that reach out into the skies where remarkable sunrises and sunsets take place and just-warm-enough partly cloudy days soothe the soul, reminding you that all in all, it’s an amazingly beautiful world we live in, isn’t it?
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