Wednesday Evenings with Babs Pt. 06

About fifty feet from the porch are two trees of probably thirty feet in height. I watch as their appearance changes with the seasons. The bright green leaves of Spring, the bright reds and yellows of Fall, and the dark bare branches contrasted against the white of the snow in Winter. One evening as I sat there in solitary meditation, I decided to give both of the trees a name. The one on the right is Sandy, the one on the left is... Barbara. Sometimes a gentle breeze will blow, causing their leaves to rustle. And in that sound, sometimes I think I can hear their whispered voices. No, I'm not lonely and old age crazy. Just have a very active, vivid and sentimental imagination.

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Epilogue

The idea to write this story first came to mind one evening in early May 2020, while watching one of those sunsets from my porch. As was the case with tens of millions of other people, Covid-19 had me hunkered down in my house. It was one of those rare periods since becoming a widower where a sense of isolation crept in.

The more I thought about it, the more enthusiastic I became about actually putting to the written word this saga of so long ago. If nothing else, I figured it would give my mind something to dwell on besides the pandemic. So I turned off the TV and all its depressing news, turned on the radio and tuned it to a 'mood music' FM radio station, then curled up on the sofa with my laptop and began the process of combing through memories now a half-century old. Scouring those memories for details that would result in as accurate an account as they would collectively produce. In the end, I wanted to produce a result that not only described things the way they really were, but also my emotions. The excitement, fears, and insecurities. The way the culture of the era influenced things. And when I was through, how I felt about all of this fifty-plus years later. I fully intended to submit it to Literotica when I was done.

The bulk of the writing took about four weeks. Another week or so of proofreading and condensing overly wordy sections. So why has it taken three years to appear on Lit? The best explanation/excuse I can come up with is that I had an attack of bashfulness. This story was so personal that when the point of commitment came, I found myself asking the question 'Are you really up for turning this loose?' So it languished on my laptop until this Summer (2023). Then as the Summer began to sizzle and staying inside became more attractive than going outside to simmer, bashfulness gave way to 'f**k it', and after breaking it up into the six parts, finally here we are.

One final note... Each morning during story development, I would throw back the curtains to watch as the leaves gradually returned to Sandy and Barbara. After the leaves were full and the temps milder, I would sit out on the porch and continue working, and if a sudden breeze rustled the leaves, I would look out, chuckle to myself, and say "Are you two fighting over me again?'