The second thing.

Despite the heat index reaching 102 today – something everybody keeps telling me doesn’t happen on the Cape – I managed a five-mile run this morning. I’d gone to the transfer station around 8:30 to dump the big bucket of compost and realized I could handle the thick air after all, that it would in fact be one of those marginal runs where I might have to pause to keep from having to sit down, but that when it was over, the shower would feel like a line on my CV under "awards and honors."

Just as I got to the section of the fire roads that gets me far enough away to make it five miles on return, a strange beast ran across the road 75  or so feet ahead. The way it walked looked suggested a cat, but  it was much too big for a cat, even a Maine coon. The tail hung like an uncomfortably warm feline’s, but again, it wasn’t right; this tail was too bushy, as was the rest of the body.

And then it turned to look at me with an otherworldly face halfway between a bear and a weasel. I backed away slowly and then took off running to where I’d come from, gazing over my shoulder occasionally to make sure I hadn’t triggered in it a chase instinct.

Now I know it was a fisher. Per Wikipedia, “The fisher (Pekania pennanti) is a carnivorous mammal native to North America, a forest-dwelling creature whose range covers much of the boreal forest in Canada to the northern United States. …It is sometimes referred to as a fisher cat, although it is not a cat.”

Definitely not a cat.

After an outdoor shower, I plated myself a heaping serving of the ceviche from last night – chunked local dabs, kosher salt, lime juice, diced avocado, green olives sliced thin, and finely minced onions. That put me right enough to force myself to go do 2,000 words at the public library, where the air conditioning was generous and the stacks undistracting. I promised myself I would not get up before I hit 2,000 new words (after a successful first 500 yesterday). I made a point of drinking two big glasses of water beforehand – time-limiting how long I could sit – so that I could yell at the muse to hurry up if needed.

She’s not really here yet, though, which is not too surprising. The initial writing isn’t going to be elegant; it never is. She knows it isn’t yet time for her, and like the most arrogant of surgeons, she never shows up until the site is fully prepped. The work now is for me, laying out the structure of the argument, remembering the anecdotes that will function as the funnels, identifying which texts I need to draw in to the vortex. I hit my target without her.

And, since getting back to the cabin on the estuary, it’s been a steady stream of strange small strong storms, lightning and thunder with rain that sounds heavy but doesn’t seem to be. The localized nature of the outbursts has left the sun shining from one direction or another throughout, and the light green lichen on the trees is consequently lit like white cake icing. It looks a little like a groovy black-light scene, the DayGlo paints slapped on the long pine trunks in imitation of Jackson Pollack. Tomorrow I know the beach sand will be all riled up again from the storms, making the run along it thick and sloppy like it was today. The hidey-hole crabs just keep digging out.

As for me digging out, yesterday I had the benefit of having to write my editor’s introduction to the fourth issue of the magazine, so I had my second thing. My brain always needs at least two writing projects, or I just can’t write. In fact, I’m only writing this to have had the second thing today.

I’ve tried over the years to understand why I need two at a minimum, and all I can figure is that you can’t string a bow without tension. It’s why having a job doesn’t get in the way of a book that is unrelated; instead, it facilitates it.

The rain is letting up again. Merlin says: chipping sparrow, nuthatch, bluebird, cardinal, chickadee, and a pine warbler. The last is new to me, but I see it on my forays, flitting about like a picky shopper at Zabar’s. Tomorrow, another 2,000, this time with more structure.