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Once upon a time, I was very sad and everything was very dark, even the sky. The window was open, and I lay in bed under my blanket, feeling the whisper-cool of the night air and listening to the sprinklers count fourth notes in the distance. It was quiet, it was dark, peaceful and somber.
A solitary croak broke through the silence. It lingered for a minute and suddenly there was a response, a ribbit calling loudly across the ferns. Seconds later the air filled with frog songs, all sizes and shapes. Some of the frogs trilled loudly and quickly, some were more meditative with deeper, longing noises that reminded me of sing song burps. They began to call out together in froggish chorus, bouncing croaks along the garden like maniacal tennis balls.
I stared at the ceiling and listened to the love songs of hundreds of frogs in Spring, trilling like wind up toys, sounding exactly how it should sound as it bounces along the moonlight, looking for a lady friend. The calls became so loud it became impossible to think of anything else, to distinguish one frog noise from another. It was thick and loud and buoyant...I thought I might reach out and touch it.
The frog symphony drowned out the sterile sprinkler. The frogs broke through the darkness, and my blanket, and my bad mood. I didn't feel so melancholy. The world is hard and full of evil, but frogs testify to another side. A hoppy-er side, if you will. They don't worry about where their next fly will come from, even though they probably could; flies are unpredictable and rude creatures, always showing up at the wrong place at the wrong time. The frogs just called as loudly as possible, echoing through the yard.
The frogs sang on and I knew without a doubt that joy is a real possibility. Real joy is heard in the amphibian opera, and if a frog can find joy in the darkness, so can I. The thought brought me comfort when I thought I might croak, and I closed my eyes with a deep gratitude to the webbed footed fellas that lined the lily plants in May.