[pre:1iweb6qe]It is customary to begin such stories with a description of the wind.
I must admit, however, a certain sense of trepidation at the thought of following
custom in these matters, for the line between time-honored tradition and shameless
mimicry grows painfully thin when dealing with stories like this one, the one you are
about to hear: the one you are hearing now. So let it suffice to say that there was wind,
whatever form - foul, light, or fair, cool, wan or harsh - it took, and that Nimrod either
did or did not enjoy the feel of the wind, the sound of the wind, the salty taste of the
wind, or the way the wind moved the world around it with the same magnanimous grace
with which he addressed each thing he encountered.
He wore a gentle smile, albeit plain, as off-white and uncultured as the paper
against which he pressed the tip of his short paintbrush. He wrote in a curling script that
trailed upwards as it reached the right side of the page, and the words read:

Dear Mother,
The wind has changed since last I wrote. It is not what blows me
forward on my journey, but it is a gracious companion, and one whose
company I accept without reserve or question.
I wish I could say it seems like just yesterday that I left the islands,
but it is not so. Memories fade as surely as night turns to day with the dawn,
and what little I remember is clothed in the fog of nostalgia, corrupted by
hyperbole where time has chewed its fabric like the old attic moths.
You may recall from my previous letters that I am now in a land
called Muhir, spotted with magnificent cities, the likes of which I could have
never seen back on the islands. But that's not all there is to see. Today, I
walked through fields of wheat the color of sand, as endless as the waves
as they stretch to the horizon. I wish I could show you, take the memories
from my head and send them to you alongside this letter, just so you could
see it.
But life isn't that easy, and this letter won't even be sent until I can find
some place to send it. I just hope wherever you are when you read this -
whatever you're doing, and whomever's there with you - you know you were
the one I missed when the wind changed over the untilled wheat, when the
sun washed over my skin like liquid on the Muhirian plain.

The end of his paintbrush found his lips as he read over what he had written, his eyes
scanning the letters like mice scrabbling along a wooden floor. A warm smile tickled his
cheeks, and he set ink to paper again:

Okay, so it was a tad dramatic, but I thought I'd try a poet's pants
on for size. Not a bad fit, if a bit loose about the waist. I hope everything is
going well at the house.
I love you. I miss you.
Nimrod

He held the letter at arm's length, examining its form more than its content: how all
the words fit on the page, the shapes he could pick out from its body, and how the spaces
between the words could be navigated with vertical and horizontal lines. He felt a twinge
of annoyance when he noticed his letters trailed upwards as they reached the right side of
the page, but it was not so much of an annoyance to make him rewrite the letter. It wasn't
that bad, anyway, he told himself. He was just looking for the error. He nodded contentedly.
Then, he wiped his paintbrush along the wheat-laden ground, leaving slowly fading
trails of ink to dry on the germ, fattened by rain and the bounty of the earth. He stowed his
paintbrush, then neatly folded the letter in three, creasing the folds between his thumb and
forefinger as cleanly as he could. It fit into his rudimentary envelope without issue, and rather
than glue, lick, or stamp the envelope with a wax seal, Nimrod simply folded the top flap into
the envelope itself, trapping the letter inside. He set the letter in his lap as he tapped the top
back onto his flask of paint and, upon suitably stowing the flask, grabbed the envelope, waited
a second as though to appraise the moment, then rose in a single, fluid motion.
He walked, and a hand absentmindedly slipped the letter into a bulging satchel at his hip,
filled to the brim and beyond with identical, unsent letters.[/pre:1iweb6qe]