family

My daughters' homes have bits of my past in it. I notice these as I spend some minutes in their houses today. A few modest family trinkets, photos on a refrigerator -- from their childhood...






...and also photos that I took when I was very young,  Ones that my younger girl dug up from some storage box.






Stuff doesn't matter -- I always say that and think that actually, but some stuff is laden with memories, good ones. And a trinket here, a plate there and suddenly you have the feeling of continuity. Small fragments of the past infused into a new reality. I smile at that, liking so much the new reality that I see in my daughters' lives.


Last night was festive as the girls, their guys, their dad and I gathered for a dinner at Bristol.
While we ate, the rains came down hard. What terrific luck to have the showers wash the sidewalks clean while we were in the warm glow of the restaurant!











The birthday girl. And below, with mom.







And then puff! The rains went by and it was summer again. An evening in Chicago. Ending with the familiar routine of cake and presents. Adding new photos to a family album of memorable milestones.
















In the morning, my younger one leaves early for work.






Her fiancé's off too, so that I am now alone, lingering at their place over my breakfast -- carefully stocked by her for my funny preferences of granola, fruit and kefir (and coffee).






And then I am off. To return soon, with, one hopes, the proper papers for stage x of the saga of documenting nothing special at all -- just a continuation of being a dual citizen. Even as my home is so much here now. In Madison. At the farmhouse.





Later:

Thursday evening is market time for us -- our community market, down the road, where farmer Lee also sells her veggies.






But we don't need a lot. Our own garden is now producing.





So we pick up some bread, a few ears of corn -- the supplements, you might say.






And we head back. Via the tennis courts. We play, we laugh, we go home -- a peaceful place. With its own sets of original ideas about what creates family.

But I see that there's a message on my phone: the Polish consul, the second one, with the different conversation agenda is trying to reach me. I quickly call back. And would you believe it -- he completely contradicts everything that the first Polish consul told me yesterday!
No, no! you need to file your divorce papers with the Polish court first!

It's been a long times since I shouted in Polish.

I put down the phone and I fix the salad, steam the corn, the garden peas, grill chicken brats and sit down to eat with Ed. Isis comes in in time to get the tail end of a chicken brat.