Right now I’m taking a ride. My ass is firmly planted on my mother’s badly upholstered pink chair but my mind is so far away I can barely feel my buns going numb. I’m listening to music. Music that is so deeply associated with a time and a place that I can’t stop myself from going there. It’s night and I’m sitting outside under a starry sky, a thick milky band cutting right down the middle, round moon, crisp with a foggy halo. The air is light but at times makes the hairs on my arms perk upright, if only for a second as the wind picks up. And it’s dark, so amazingly dark. Five feet away the world is swallowed up in darkness but it’s a calm darkness. No hostility, no fear. I know what’s out there I would just rather wait until tomorrow morning to take a walk. For now I am happy, perched on a two foot concrete ledge in my slippers and my sweater, cup of coffee, strong and sweetened with cane, in my hand. The music is quiet, trickling over from the crack in the living room door. Cassia Eller, interrupted by kitchen sounds, the tinklings of the ritual of night time coffees. Spoons hit sugar bowls, a kettle boils and Cassia continues to sing, throaty and low. She sings about words, palavras. It’s all I understand but the song still makes me weak in the stomach, I feel soft inside, warm and contented. I make up the rest of the song in my head, make it mine and sip my coffee under that Brasilian moon, soft hands of my shoulders, a kiss on the cheek and a hint of jasmine in the air...