Summer rain

It'a late summer. The air is heavy with heat and the haze of collected moisture. Tractors are ploughing the fields, disking for the 2nd time before the rain. On the way to the base, I pass a little ball field that fills with young families and their children practicing soft ball every evening. On the other side of the road lie brown fields with tufts of grass that refuse to be conquered by the plough. Past the wheat growing grounds, the air fields. Run-ways stretch way out beyond chain link fencing where the round-nose "Tweets" take off and the pointy nosed T38s make smooth descents after their play of 4-plane formations.
A few new girlfriends--"the wives"-- watch from our sunny side of the Plains Pool on base, camped out in white lounge chairs. We watch our husbands or their classmates weave spins up there in the delicately clouded sky. And we read and talk and finally jump in with the float-playing children to cool off in the water.