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The day I got it the temperature had warmed to 12 degrees from an overnight low of
-4. Whether a cause for optimism or despair I leave to you.

I found it in the drugstore displayed next to non-prescription sleep aids, Sominex
and the store's generic flanking it. Actually flanking them. For there were several
pretty little square boxes stacked one upon the other. A picture on each box showed
its contents: a charming plastic well whose plastic sides were in the colors and
shape of a stone wall. Sprigs of plastic vegetation sprouted cheerfully all around.
There was a rustic and rusty-looking plastic pump aimed to flow into a plastic
wooden bucket, set at a tilt so that it in turn would empty into an old wooden plastic
tub which, also in turn, spilled its contents back into the reservoir. The pump was
framed by a wooden fence, plastic of course, but made to look like it had aged and
splintered during a bucolic and distant American past and not in Beijing.

The box proclaimed the sound of the well's spring to be restful and soothing. And
it would be a long time until I could depend again on a troutstream to rest and
soothe me. Look at all of them all stacked up! A hot item! They're expecting
land-office sales. I grabbed one up, took it to the register, then drove off toward
home with my treasure. Ponce, I said to myself like one more Dakota snowbird
obsessed with the possibility of spirit-renewing waters. Ponce de Leon.

When we sat at our dinner table, the well's reservoir had been filled, its batteries were
installed, and it occupied a place of honor between the mashed potatoes and roast beef,
and alongside the gravy boat. Trying to appear modest, I smiled at my wife and threw the
switch.

Splash! as the bucket filled. Click! as it tipped to dump its water into the tub. Slosh!
as the tub emptied into the reservoir. Thump! as the bucket righted itself and with not
the slightest pause resumed the whole show again. And again. Imagine if you will an
up-tempo Splash! Click! Slosh! Thump! repeated in a winter without end. My jaw
dropped.

Bringing her laughter under control, my wife patted me on the shoulder and kissed
my balding dome. "It's wonderful, Bill. Wonderful! In fact it would be hard to find
anything more serene."

"Except a Gene Krupa drum solo?"

"Except that."

Thanks Ed. It's Scott's thread of course. And now that it's achieved a life or two
of its own, I thought he wouldn't mind too much. A fellow Black Hillser, he's aware
how squirrelly they can get.