Crossing Borders

For six months my next door neighbor, a land baron who gives little thought to the quality of the community, selling off the farmland he inherited to make a fortune, has been building ticky-tacky housing lots in the tract of land outside my window. One of the reasons I took this place was for the unimpeded view of the rice paddies that extends all the way to the horizon. Now half the rice paddies are gone, replaced with newly graded streets and aerating mounds of new housing lots.

I think the land gods have got it in for me…

For the last three nights, wanting to test my tarps and tents for my upcoming trip to the Alps, I crept out onto the soft soil, alone in the darkness, and set up the shelters. For this short time the land was mine. The wind blew, the shelters luffed in the gusts, and the sky opened above me without a roof to break the expanse. Orion watched with approval.

Then, in defiance of the distant lights of houses and apartments, I unzipped my fly and urinated in a full arc. There, unto thee I water the world!

Now I can go home and hold in my heart: to pee where no one has peed before!