Kath Abela Wilson

Happy Hour

A glass dining room with-thirty foot windows in a wide semicircle facing the frozen whiteness of the Canadian Rockies. A blank slate, no people, no animals, no birds, a dramatic canvas, peak upon peak painted by drifts. On this bright, late afternoon, I notice that the sky's blueness as a backdrop creates a dreamlike dynamic. But mostly, all of that emptiness is ignored in the loud chatter at the tables, the clatter of white dishes coming and going. Then, without warning, conversations stop, all eyes are on it –

                      the quick
           silent slide
of a small avalanche