A Drizzle in the Evening

It had been a day of hesitation. The storm that was promised by the forecast hung around sullen and lurking like teenage boys smoking around the corner. It sputtered and wheezed, a few miserly drops and a ghost of a blow. By evening, like two feeble boxers, exhausted from just standing around, it still threatened emptily.
I canceled plans to watch a movie with a friend. Secretly excited, I decided to have a special stay-at-home evening. In the dim light of the day's end, I sat with a pot of jasmine tea at the edge of my patio garden. Dark clouds above and a gratifying emptiness in my head. It began to rain lightly. More like mist, it gave a silky texture to the quiet of the evening.
The tea smelled of summer, of fragrant nights in exotic lands. My garden, I noticed, had changed. It was rebelling against the forced sleep of winter, stretching and yawning, getting to the work at hand. The ornamental maple trees that tastefully arch at the corners of the fence were finally getting dressed. Carefully unfolded new-green leaves, branchtips complete with gaggles of tiny red ballerina flowers wearing white tutus.
A robin flew by. With the whoosh of wings in my ears, it landed with a fat thump on the fence. It sized me up, left-eyed, canting her head to get a good view. I returned the compliment, from the corner of my right eye. Before I could offer my visitor a cup of tea, she flew back the way she came, leaving me marvelously satisfied with a conversation I can't remember.