The kids are gone, again, and the exes, still. Feeling too old for a puppy or an even slightly younger lover, it’s just her and the cats and the sound of coyotes. Days off and evenings are hers, remodeling to her own tastes and needs, writing or reading or old movies, maybe wandering the scrub land around the place with a camera or bottle. Nights are for satisfied dreams of living happy and nightmares that will never get enough of her. With the dawn she undresses and swims in the pool, no one to criticize or shame the skin she’s grown comfortable with except the high hawks who fix on every movement of her body carefully but could care less.