There’s a little of that lost feeling when she disappears, like something was subtracted in the energy that lifts your day. Like those episodes of “Happy Days” after Richie left, or “Cheers” after Diane’s departure. It goes on. It’s still pleasant. But, it’s, well, *different*. But, here, you flip the switch to that happiness of anticipation! You know this actor hasn’t left the show completely! She was just on hiatus! That yin/yang idea saves the day! If it’s sad, well, then you know happy will return! It has to! It always does. If it’s dark, you know light will shine again. It’s that happy dance Alex Baldwin gives in “It’s Complicated” – gleefully jumping up and down! *“She’s comin’ back!!”* When that moon disappears and goes balsamic, it’s all balsamic dressing on crisp romaine for you, because you know that just means the moon will return again! It always does! You don’t call it a missing moon! You call it a New Moon! And, sure enough, you tap your fingers with happy anticipation … And, BOOM! CLAP! WOW! *THERE SHE IS!!!* Bursting in blues and golds! It feels like a big yolk sun – like that one wearing sunglasses on the ol’ Raisin Bran box – bouncing gleefully and squeezing itself through your doorframe to fit into your room! But, it’s way too big for the room, so thankfully it’s bendy like a rubber ball!! The sunglasses fall off its face as it’s completely misjudged the 8-foot ceiling as this sun is twenty-feet tall! But, it’s still happy! “Hey, you wanna just push me back to the doorframe? I can squeeze out, really! I hope it’s no trouble!” And you happily salvage its sunglasses and roll the sun outside and you bounce up and down together, laughing! “Did you see her?!” you ask! “I saw her!! Why do you think I rise and shine every morning? To light her space!” She lights up everything that way! She’s the most beautiful woman in the world!! She really is!! You went on memory of that face, and that warmed your heart, but when she’s back it’s like she’s bursting through an iMax screen! Life-nurturing eyes – two of them, no less! – each twenty-feet tall! You don’t know which one to walk into first! And the 3-D glasses fly off your nose!! And, the raisin bran Sun comforts you, saying, “Don’t sweat it! Happens to me all the time!” You’re Woody in Toy Story after a long wait in the toy box. You’re Puff-the-Magic-Dragon coming out of your cave. And that’s the joy of it! You expect nothing of it, nothing of her. And you get so much! How can it be so pure? The reward is baked in! She’s silly! She’s fun! She’s that trip to the beach with the top down! She’s the raisin bran sun! The summer morning sun! That one that colors the world like lemon, and squeezes like lemon – not the shimmering gold of later day. She’s lemon sun dancing off fiery hair blowing wild, and the whole world is new! When she’s silly, the world is silly! Bay windows swing open and bursts of sea air whip any cares away. Caught up in the lightness of her! And, by way of her, everything! It’s what she does! And, like a thespian preparing for her next great part, she slips into serious as smoothly as picking a card from the playing deck. And, she goes from ‘Summer It Girl’ to Regal – all in the space of an Ace. She’s Aces and Queens. She’s sevens and fours. And dreams of twos. She’s King-sized heart. A full suite of hearts! Dreaming of diamonds. Some days I’m the Joker, but the joker is wild – with glee. She does that to me! You can’t mistake her playfulness. It summons the world to close its books and run to the playground! Recess!! She leads the way! Nobody does it better. With a head turn, a laugh, a guffaw, she flings magic around the room like it’s some inexhaustible resource! It is. She dips her hand in the well. No need for conserving! There’s magic for everybody, because she’s always making more. She’s Doris Day on a spring day! Leaving me in a swoon, playing only Doris Day songs on “Alexa” for months, because, I don’t know, it’s the sweetness of it. The gentleness. Gentleness that fits that kind of love for her. But then Doris died. And my thought was, “Oh, Gosh, I killed her (you say “gosh” more with Doris Day). Making this poor woman sing twenty-four hours a day – for me!” I had this little game where the first song Alexa played – *that* would be the song to signify how I might have made her feel that day – if she ever peeked and caught a word of me. Who knows? Anything is possible! Like a virtual tarot deck with Doris on the cards! When the first song played is “Everybody Loves a Lover,” I picture her all shining! Feeling all twenty-four of the karats of magic she is! Maybe it’s “My Buddy” or “Secret Love!” A fella can dream, can’t he? (You say “fella” more with Doris Day.) A magic 8-ball of sorts! O.C.D., sure. But O! C! – HER – !! – and you’ll understand! When a guy has to feel his way in the dark, he feels his way in the dark! Even if Doris Day is the channel. It’s the obvious thing! “Guy in love with girl where there is no method of communication?” Instant answer is, “Doris Day on Alexa!” Of course! “With first song signifying how she feels about you?” the guy next to you finishes the question before you can ask, just to make you feel better! “You got it!” he adds. “Don’t feel weird! It’s the age-old thing! Everybody’s doing it!” … So, yeah … Doris Day … Kind of an awkward pause there, then he adds, “I mean, it’s not like it’s Patti Page, right? It’s Doris Day! She’s like … the Metallica of Easy-Listening!” Another awkward pause. He goes to sip from his straw, but instead tosses it on the napkin and takes a manly swig of his lemonade. Because she’s that lemon sun! That raisin bran sun! She lets you shine! She’s the reason you rise in the morning, and are set to thoughts of her at night. A big ol’ 20-foot raisin bran sun squeezed into the room checking for spelling errors over your shoulder, both of us losing our glasses – over her! I say, “Why were you away so long?” And the sun answers, “I was never away! The earth turns, but I’m always right here!” And that’s how it is with her. She’s always lighting the space! And *that’s* how you make people feel! All over the place! ❤️