the next phase

 Surely you do not want to hear that I did a clean sweep of three grocery stores today? Is there a story in that? Perhaps not a story, but room for a smile: does anyone else walk away from Woodman's giddy, after loading up a shopping cart with many, many jugs of fruit juice (blueberry-grape-wild cherry -- mmmm! Diluted with sparkling lemon mineral water -- the best!) and many many packs of sparkling lemon mineral water?

And I’m no longer surprised when, at Trader Joe’s, the clerk asks if I make my own trail mix since my cart is full of unsalted pistachios, lightly salted cashew pieces and peanuts. Oh and how could I forget – so many containers of chocolate covered raisins. (The answer is -- I do not.)

I venture out to town so infrequently that I now buy as if for a winter season in North Dakota. Anticipating a powerful snowstorm. That will bury me deep for four months. Without access to unsalted pistachios, chocolate covered raisins and sparkling lemon mineral water.

At the farmette, my focus has...evolved. To grading – but please don’t let me get into the habit of repeating day in and day out for the next two weeks that I’m grading. Know that whatever else I may be doing, I’m also grading. There, I’ve said it.

And what else? Ah, the seasonal job of carrying water to the thirsty plants. Much of it is accomplished by standing still with a pointed hose. But some of it is significantly more taxing. I am reminded of the resentful kids of Monet, the artist. They complained that their childhood was lost to watering his expansive gardens. My plots aren’t one hundredth as vast, but they stretch far and wide so that even multiple extensions to the hose wont do. And so I carry the watering can. Back and forth. To keep the flowers satisfied.

(Sorry, how could I forget: and the fruits and veggies.)

It’s an evening task and one that, honestly -- I sort of like. At least now, in the early stages of the growing season.

Then, tonight, a special return to town – for a Mother’s Day meal at Graze. This is the city trip I’m always happy to make: for a meal with the terrific younger set.

My littlest one is, of course, in Chicago, but in spirit she is there too. And since it's "Mother's Day," I am left to open boxes. (These days, insofar as I am at all decently dressed, it is because they attend to me in this way. What I am wearing for example is, from head to toe, their doing -- from a recent birthday.)

At the end of it all, Rosie transports me home. Past a sun that set over the fields, past deer that always come out when I ride at their hour of play.

A beautiful evening. You could not hope for a better one.