chasing the sun

When your workable outdoor space is increasing its shade quotient and you still insist on planting sun loving flowers, you have to improvise. Yesterday, we created a bed extension in the courtyard. The sunny courtyard. Today, I dug away at the ground cover in one bed that still has pockets of strong sunshine. I can do better than ground cover! I moved the stuff over to a shady spot and prepared the spot for maybe six new flowering plants. And I weeded one of the troubled beds -- the one by the driveway. All in the warmth of a beautiful spring day!

Of course, first came the morning stuff which these days always begins with my long gaze at the flower fields. Especially the one that I planted with daffodils last fall. A total success! The flowers are big and beautiful.

And I drove to the bakery to pick up cookies for Sparrow and croissants for us all. Oh, those bakery smells! Intoxicating!

And Ed and I sat down to breakfast.

 

 

One topic that has been on my mind (but not on his!) is how we go forward as we age. Will I move? Will he? Will we both grow old here? Who can tell! The imponderables of life. Still, I feel we need to have some strategy to tackle problems before they arise and we do spend a considerable amount of time on weighing our options. Did we come to any conclusions? Yes! ...that we need to work out some strategies!

When you are done with college or professional school or technical training you still have many divergent paths before you and you have that early life insecurity of not knowing where you will be five years down the road. Alone? With a partner? East coast? West coast? City? Country? Planning for a family? Still seeking satisfactory employment? Very few of us map out with any precision the path forward. We leave so much to chance, we keep doors open. At least that's what I did. Sure, by mid twenties I had a vague plan and by age 28 I was married, pregnant and applying to law school in the place where I lived. So things stabilized pretty quickly for me. And yet there were major shifts still to come. All the way until retirement.

It is really a bit of a surprise now to realize that the uncertainty of your early twenties is nothing compared to the uncertainty of post retirement. So much of what you do with those years depends on your health outcomes and those of your partner if there is (still?) such a person! And on your capacity to do things you've wanted to do. Your daily life can do an about face with one diagnosis, one heart attack, one kick from some external force. Your options then are set by how well prepared you are for this. I truly believe you are better off with your bases covered. And so this morning, Ed and I talked about covering those bases.

And then it's back to garden work which, I hope, will be with me til the day I die.

 

In the afternoon I'm back to picking up the two older grandkids.

 

It's such a gorgeous day that you'd think they'd want to just revel in its loveliness. But no, the twosome are in love with their routines. Or -- tired. Or both! A brief saunter to the crab apple tree (and now I have two climbers!)...

Then inside we go.

 

And late in the day Ed is back to doing his weekly bike ride. Me, I keep the porch door wide open. To let spring seep into the house and fill every nook and corner with her freshness and sweet scent of evening air.