By now, all the vaccinated people I know have returned to at least some degree of shopping. (What a winning strategy we have -- you protect yourself with a vaccination and perhaps more importantly, you protect your community from further spread/mutations!) I bet you wont be surprised to learn that I have not yet shopped. Indeed, I still haven't been inside a grocery store (or cafe, or restaurant) since.... oh, early March. Of 2020.
There are really only two reasons for this store avoidance: first of all, even in normal times, I hardly ever shop. Grocery stores -- yes, in the past: routinely and with some degree of pleasure. But otherwise? Almost never. Secondly -- I hate to admit it, but I have gotten rather fond of having someone else bring our groceries to us. It's a 90 minute savings for me (if you count the round trip travel) and at this point, I need all those minutes for yard work (and grandkids and mom stuff).
But today, I broke that long spell of abstinence. (And last week, Ed broke his long spell too.) It happened in the late morning and by accident.
I'd been taking care of the animals and picking a weed here and there (but mostly admiring all that's growing and blooming right now)...
(lilacs!)
(still the crab apple...)
(the last of the tulips...)
(the first of the irises)
And we sat down to breakfast (with The Cat, and inside, because we're in a cols spell)...
And we reviewed what work still needs to be done. For Ed, the list is suddenly huge. We thought the trees we ordered were lost somewhere in transport or that the tree farm simply forgot our order, but no! Turns out they are on their way! Expect them next week, the growers tell us. As he lists his tasks -- preparing weed mats, cages, finishing chopping, pruning, mowing, starting in on digging -- I almost want to tune out. It's a hefty set of chores!
Mine today is considerably lighter (but not light enough so that I can help him make a dent in his). And it starts off with picking up local asparagus from the market drop off site and, too, picking up a couple of breakfast treats for tomorrow's Mother's Day breakfast. I know -- bakery items should be fresh, I should do this tomorrow, but I'm afraid I wont really want to bother tomorrow and I do miss my French breakfasts an awful lot. So I head out.
As I pull up to the bakery, I give myself a firm little scold for making them do a curbside delivery when I am perfectly capable of stepping inside the store. So I park the car and go in. And I don't just pick up the paid for treats. I look around. I spot beautiful cakes in the display window.
I chat to the seller. And I cannot resist it -- I buy one of the cakes for tomorrow's dinner. That constitutes shopping!
[Ed's break out into the world of stores happened when he went to Harbor Freight to pick up a tool part. Isn't this just so us? He breaks isolation by shopping for a tool, I break my spell by shopping in a bakery!]
In the afternoon, I put in four more perennials and, too, I feel it is safe enough weather wise to plant the sweet peas. This last job is a bit of a chore since I have to build chicken wire cages for the plants. The sweet pea flower is extremely vulnerable out here: the groundhog thinks it's a better treat than a cake out of a bakery! To each her own.
(pausing to watch a bee coming in for a landing...)
Evening: our quiet time. I have no doubt Ed will zonk out early. Spending a day outdoors does that to you. Me? I'm enjoying too much the popcorn he popped, a glass of Chablis and my delicious mystery novel. So him, so me.
