Midsummer night's dream~

Midsummer eve~
Click on photos to enlarge them.

What better way to spend a midsummer evening than a picnic on the lawn overlooking a vineyard … listening to live music … drinking wine … watching kids play the air guitar… smiling at the others enjoying the same thing  … while the setting sun puts on a fantasia in light?

Being there with friends, maybe. But last night we made a last minute decision to go to Westport Rivers Winery for the Friday night concert. We tossed sandwiches and fruit into a cooler and went by ourselves. We sat in the crowd, eating and drinking to the mellow sound of One Bad Ant, a local singer—Gary Duquette--with his unplugged mix of country songs. Good stuff.

 Summer concert~

The evening was a people watcher's delight, and I'd often find people watching back. I'd been glancing at a nearby woman who reminded me of a younger friend. This is just how she'll look when she ages—pleasingly plump and like she's a lot of fun. The kind of person who's always wearing a smile.

Later this woman saw Bruce and me doing the "you-take-my-picture; I'll-take-yours" thing, and she came over and offered to take one of us together.

"If you saw me watching you, it's because you remind me of a friend," I told her. She said a man once told her she had a Norman Rockwell look about her.

 Bruce and me~

Indeed, the whole event would have had Norman sketching to beat the band, so Americana it was. There was a group of mixed-race families and their children sitting together. I wished Rockwell were still here to capture this changing face of America and let its beauty shine.  We need these pockets of humanity, people spending a few hours together for no purpose other than enjoying the moment, to remind us that we're all in this together--sharing a brief moment in a world that depends upon working together and recognizing the similarities beneath the thin layer of skin that holds our important parts together.
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One of my theories is that the hearts of men are about alike, no matter what their skin color. ~Mark Twain