Let's try that again

My daughter gave me this book for my birthday:

There are people who are chocoholics. There are people who love sugar in any form. There are dessert folks, cookie lovers, ice cream nuts. In small doses, I do like something sweet at the end of the day. But I'm not a sugar fiend. A chocolate nibble is very satisfying, but here, too, I'm not crazy greedy. Both Ed and I may like a jammy croissant for breakfast, but we rarely eat a full blown dessert in the course of a day. 

Nonetheless, I love fruity, jammy baked goods. My girl did not realize (or maybe she did?) that she hit just the right note with this book: baking with preserves sounds about as delicious as desserts can get.

We are right now in my favorite weeks of fruits: berries, peaches, cherries, at peak flavor. Two weeks of June, two weeks of July. It does not get any better than this. Sure, we are spoiled rotten and eat berries all year long, but flavor-wise -- this is the month to really go wild.

You could say, therefore, that this is the worst time for me to travel. To be away. To miss out. Except that I don't miss out! Places that I go to are more or less in the same growing season as we are here, in south-central Wisconsin. What I can eat here, I can also eat there. Moreover, when I travel, I do tend to sample more desserts, just because I want to taste stuff baked by others and what better chance to do so than when away. It's where I learn, too, about different varieties of fruits -- of berries, for example. Sample, taste, bring home ideas. So yes, I'm going away next week, but I wont leave my favorite fruits by the wayside.

 

Okay, stormy morning, wet buggy walk to the barn, to the meadow. Pick flowers, hurry home.

Eat breakfast on the porch with Ed. We defrost a croissant so that we can taste some of the jam we made yesterday -- me with hardly enough strength to hold up a wooden spoon! 

And we proclaim the jam to be absolutely delicious. More intense strawberry flavor than I have ever tasted in a jam. Fabulous.

But...

... it's just a bit too liquidy. I dont like pectin congealed jams. I like them to be on the loose side, but not too loose.

This is when I reach for my Jam Bake book. 

It's not that I have never made jams before, it's just that I've rarely done it and haven't gone back to it in years. My long run of oatmeal/granola breakfasts meant that jams usually sat in the fridge until they sprouted mold. What's the point of making more of rarely eaten jams?

But, things are different now. Croissants are my BBFs (best breakfast friends), ever since I discovered that freezing them fresh does not take away from their awesomeness. And, secondly, Ed is into making jams with me.

I open up the book to a strawberry jam and note that their recipe isn't that much different than the one Ed found on line. Great minds think alike! And then I have to laugh. Camilla Wynne, the book's author writes: "Despite strawberry jam being one of the more difficult jams to master, it's often the first thing novice preservers try their hand at." Indeed! Because we all go to strawberry u-picks and come home with too many berries!

You probably know why strawberries are so hard to jam correctly: they are low in pectin and so they don't "congeal" unless you hit the sweet spot. Either with an addition of store bought pectin, or with a combination of lemon juice and cooking it just exactly the right amount of time: Not too long (this is where most jammers err) but not too short either.

You can't measure jam doneness with a thermometer. A berry picked after a rainy season will have more moisture than one picked after a sunny spell. The thermometer wont account for that. You have to use your senses: a ready strawberry jam looks, feels, smells right. And you do have added tricks at your disposal to make sure it's ready to go into a jar (the drip test, and the freeze it for two minutes test). 

We begin work on our second batch of jams. [Ed: we have to use up the berries! Nina: I agree... Ed: should we try it with pectin? Nina: no! Let's learn to do it right, without the aid of pectin! Ed: are you sure? Who will eat all that jam? Nina: we will not worry about that. Let's  work on getting it perfect!]

I'm greatly aided by having my sanity with me again. Still coughing, but I slept well and so I can now pause and think through all that I know and read about preserving. We go with the Jam Bake book suggestions, using her's and Ed's recipes, but using too all our senses that allow us to be smarter jam makers.

We wash the berries and leave them out to dry...

 

And then we go out for a bike ride before it gets too beastly hot.

(Ed: Want to split a small beer at Christie's?  Nina: Sure!)

(like a swallow has learned to fly...)

Back to preserving. Berries go into the pot. Today I add the step of macerating them for a while with the sugar and lemon juice. Then I mash it all up with my bare hands and I set the pot to a boil. We test the jam on a frozen dish. Nope, not yet. Still running together. Boil a bit longer, then boom! We are done.

We now have way too much jam and here I am already scheming on how I can do some more. Blueberries next time maybe?

In the evening, the young family is here again for Sunday dinner. Both daughters along with families returned from their Mexican vacation (with other grandparents) late last night and we have very many stories to catch up on! Very many!

It's good to see them all happy and playful and full of that special joy you have after a good adventure, knowing too that you are now home again and with your old and familiar routines. I know that feeling well!

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is father's day of course. 

 

 

Do you know a father out there? Maybe send him a greeting? Maybe think about all that life threw his way when he became a dad. Maybe smile a little at the thought. Maybe. 

If you yourself are a father, I hope your day was happy!

with love...

 

a bag of small pebbles

That's how my day filled -- quite like someone pouring pebbles one by one into a sack. Little things piling up. Little pebbles. No big boulders, just little pebbles.  And suddenly the load seems great -- far more than any of us can handle.

It's a fairly pleasant day: bugs, yes, but not out of control. Sun, yes, but not excessive. No storms, no rain. A walk to the barn, to the meadow -- all good!

 

Breakfast, with Ed, on the porch. No time for market today. No new flowers. We eat leftover croissants.

 

 

And we discuss our ambitions for this day. They aren't overwhelming at all. We have a date to pick berries at Tipi Farms (our CSA guys, maybe 25 minutes south of the farmette). We do this every year, always picking far too many berries, always meaning to bake with them, always not having the time for it. Still, it's fun and any picked berry is going to be ten times better than ones you get at the store (and twice as good as those at the farmers market because we will have chosen the best ones! They're top of the berry heap)! So, berry picking... But wait: I get a call from the residents at Steffi's House. The internet installer has arrived. There are issues. Totally not their fault. I hurry over to give various permissions to fix this problem, that problem.

Okay, berry picking. We are off!

Even though I am very very tired. Not so much because yesterday was crazy busy, but because I slept very few hours. That cough! And it isn't getting any better. Hmmm... I test. Not Covid. Well that's a relief. I try to ignore it. But it does sound awful. And voice? What voice? I've lost mine... 

Well, so be it. We pick.

(Ed: can I borrow your cap? I forgot mine and you dont have a bald spot!) 

(Ed: hey, how come you have three times as many as I do?)

(Nina: Honestly, I think it's more like four times as many...)

(Ed: you want to give me  some of yours? Nina: I do not.) (In the end, of course, we pull them all together.)

We return with lots of berries. What to do? Well, Ed is itching for us to make freezer jam. Now, this is maybe a little fun when you have what I do not have -- all the time in the world. There are plenty of superb jams out there, but Ed totally believes that we can improve on them by making our own. I leave him to find The Perfect Recipe and I go off, masked, to Steffi's House once more. The washer & dryer are being installed.

I dont linger. The Polish doc is so pregnant! No one wants to be around a coughing person when they're about to deliver their first child. 

But I dont immediately return home. I drive to the clinic. I need some wise and sensible person to tell me whether it really is possible for excessive dust exposure to produce such a monumental bronchial inflamation.

Short answer -- yes it is. You know how docs these days always hedge their bets and rarely tell you they are sure about anything? Well this one (in Urgent Care) was absolutely sure. Take this, do that. This too will pass. And now let's talk about travel! (He is near retirement and he cannot wait to take many trips each year! He was very curious where I'm going, where I've been. I almost gave him a link to Ocean.)

Relieved that I'm not contagious, I go back home, where Ed has found a "Perfect Recipe!" I haven't slept since maybe 2:30 a.m. and the idea of making jam is... well, hard to get excited about at the moment. But he is so happy with the plan that I dont have the heart to put him off. We'll need more lemons. And more sugar. I'll go get some right now! Yep, totally fired up.

He comes back from the store, my eyes are closing, I have nothing prepared for dinner. But we make jam.

And we pour it into jars and there you have it. Ready for those winter days where a bright red berry jam can really spark your croissant morning!

 

 

I dont have great ideas for anything else today. Leftover pizza, salad for supper, a few hours on the couch, then upstairs to sleep. Full day. Full of those small pebbles.

marathon Friday

Well now, this day reminded me of the years when I had a full time job, moonlighted at a restaurant, cooked dinners for the fam, ran the PTA, transported daughters to activities, and tended the yard. In other words, did all that working parents do on a daily basis. When they are younger. Decades younger!

To me, today felt like a whirl. Choreographed to the n'th degree. Every minute accounted for. It all could have toppled, but it didn't. It went smoothly, albeit at a pace that left me panting. Literally! Or, was that the dust I inhaled while furiously sleeping out a garage floor?

You really get to appreciate your slower pace, when you jump into craziness for a little bit once more. I mean, there was a time when I thrived on juggling. I felt some pride in maintaining cheerfulness at the end of a crazy day. And it wasn't fake -- I was genuinely happy to pack it in. Busy was good! These days, I'm less inclined to fill every waking hour with stuff to do. I like it when I can take a break. When I can think. When I can write. But, every once in a while, out of necessity, I get back on the fast-paced treadmill. Perhaps to prove to myself that I still can! Today I did just that.

First though, let me note that it is extremely beautiful out here, in south central Wisconsin. The weather is just about perfect -- sunny, with a light breeze, less humid than yesterday or the day before. I suppose I have some regrets that I spend so little of it outside, but still, even during the morning walk, I am so happy to feel the warmth of this glorious weather. June 14th delivered us a fine one!

(the meadows are looking better every day!)

Breakfast, with Ed, on the porch. Also with cats, but they didn't join us until later.

(hi, Ed...)

And now it begins. And it all surrounds Steffi's House. It's a project I embarked on a few months back when I agreed to help with the purchase of a new house. Steffi is not here to do this, so I offered to go through the sale -- all of it, the inspection, the walk through, the closing. And then, of course, I also offered to help a young Polish couple with the move-in today. Because they are so pregnant and so in need of a place to stay, right now!

Does the house look ready to you?

Of course it doesn't! The landscaping is just starting, the stairs aren't done. Still, inside, peace prevails. I meet the builders and we do a walk through. And it's lovely, really lovely! 

I've worked with these builders (Encore Construction) and with the awesome realtor before (Liz Lauer -- she is, simply put, the best in town). My condo (where I lived before moving to the farmette) was built by them. They are thorough, and they stand behind their work. But I have never been involved in the purchase of a brand new free standing home. I had no idea there would be 33 separate subcontractors involved, each with their set of instructions, promises and warranties! Everything from roofers to kitchen countertops. There are post-construction check lists, warranty registrations, inspections. My head is reeling!

One interesting sub-project is the landscaping: yes, there will be shrubs, small trees and such, but the house, which has almost no land with it (it's called "the new urbanism"), will have, because of its somewhat sloped location, raised flower beds facing the road. And guess who volunteered to plant those?!

I probably wont get to it until in the spring. Nonetheless, I have suddenly just added two big-ish flower beds to my list of gardening projects.

After the building walk-through (which lasted nearly two hours!), I dash to the closing, and from there, I come back to the house (well, to Tati's coffee shop next door), to meet with the person who is going to oversee the renting of this house until the owner is ready to move in. And then it's a dash back to the house, where the guy is about to install window coverings. 

By 3, all is in place and our Polish friends can come in and set up shop. We pulled together pieces of furniture that they could use in the short time they are in the house. I had to laugh: it felt very much like moving college-aged kids into their first digs outside the family home. Old but still usable stuff, barely counting as furniture. (These folks are older, but they are "in transit" and so everything here is very temporary.)

Ed was about to drive up with his pickup to unload all the stuff we accumulated for them, when the landscaping guys decide to blow away the dusty driveway and nearby bike path, covered with dirt from their loading of topsoil around the house. This is when everything suddenly disappears in a cloud of horrible dust. Ed quickly drives the pickup away from the dust storm, while I am left with a broom to clean out the garage which is now covered with dirt. I'm still coughing from that little exercise!
 

And now the Polish people are in and delighted with their space. Steffi's House is up and running. I did my work. I can sit back and exhale. With a cough, because of the dust! But mainly with a smile. All is good with our little corner here, just south of Madison. I am grateful, and happy. But for dinner, Ed picks up a pizza. No way do I want to cook tonight!

exceptionally busy Thursday

I say to Ed -- it's a conspiracy! One day it's a cat, the next, it's my mother calling for no good reason, this morning it's a storm and a cat and my mother! I'm referring to these beastly early wake-ups. The ones that rouse me way before I can punch in a solid seven hours of sleep (eight -- the target for ancient people -- seems like a dream...).

Since my mother clocks in four calls today before I can even sit down to breakfast, I decide I better work in a visit with her to see if I can adjust her habits a little. (Right now, she presses her call button. All the time. When they cease to respond with alacrity, because it's the twentieth time in the course of an hour, she calls me. It's a cycle that I wish I could break for her, but so far, I've not had any luck.) Okay, add to my growing list for the day.

But first, a walk to the barn. It's wet after the 5 o'clock storm. And buggy! So very buggy. Yuk. I take a couple of photos and move inside. Very quickly.

(a dainty Clematis climbing up an tall stump)

Breakfast is nice, though Ed is half asleep. It's early still.

And then I am off. Another appointment -- it was to be my last this week but guess what! It begets another appointment! I blame my postwar birth and the troubles I had with my lungs then. Well, no matter. I'm terrifically strong, despite it all!

Then -- my mother. I come in just as there is a meeting in the hallway of three staff members -- two aides and a nurse. On the subject of my mother. She called for help. No surprise there. She wanted a shower. Understandable. Aide came to work on that. My mother refused. Claimed she is momentarily too tired. Intervention needed!

 

 

 

Unfortunately, the shower impasse takes so much time that I can't get to my goal of setting her up with something to do that is not merely pressing the call button. But, on the upside, she is now showered.

Next -- grocery shopping. I'm going away in about a week and I want to stock up the pantry with foods not only for the week, but for the days I'm gone. For Ed. Careful planning required! 

Then -- I have a set of keys to duplicate. This is a chapter out of another kind of funny story: Steffi's House. Remember Steffi's House? This one?

Well, I'm helping my friend with the purchase of it. Closing is tomorrow. Moreover, since my friend hadn't intended to move in right away, I convinced her to let the young and very pregnant Polish couple (baby due... early next week!) use it for the summer. Sort of a terrible idea, because first of all, the house is not fully finished (you know how construction goes...) and secondly it is unfurnished. Still, they acted in reliance on this offer and they are ready to move... tomorrow! Into an unfurnished unfinished house, expecting a baby momentarily.

I've been keeping an eye on the construction issues (they always blame the rain which, I suppose is understandable given our spring this year). Last I checked, the steps weren't yet poured in outside. And because the law requires habitability as a prerequisite for the sale to move forward, the builders put in a rail all around the front entrance so that no one will fall down and break their neck. It looks very very funny! (See the rail in the photo?) As if you are forever trapped and cannot leave!

I had stopped at the hardware store to have keys made to the mailbox, because I am told that everyone always loses the key to the mailbox and so there should be multiples. I also purchased cleaning product, to remind the young couple moving in tomorrow (to this unfinished, unfurnished house) that cleanliness is important. (I have no idea if they are, in fact, fastidious. Polish habits vary in this regard.)

 

Finally, by mid afternoon, I am home. Briefly! Because it's Thursday, we have the local market taking place in the afternoon. I have a great fondness for the market and so does Ed. We are off -- me, on a bike, because I do not want to lose out on some form of exercise that is more than just getting in and out of a car.

(definitely at the peak of the strawberry season!)

On days like this one I have no time to think. [Younger people do not need to set aside time to think. They, therefore, might find it strange that I should miss time for churning out trite musings. Because, after all, I no longer attempt to solve work problems, or to help students navigate their path to degree acquisition and gainful employment. The thing is, maybe older people haven't seen it all, but they've seen a lot. And if they're at all clearheaded, they like to recall, and place current happenings in the context of their past experiences. With the belief that this leads to a deeper understanding of the way things work.Well, that's the theory at least. (My theory!) Today, no such deeper understanding was reached about anything because, as I've said, I had no time to just sit back and think.

But, my quiet week isn't over yet! I still have tomorrow! Even as it promises to be a not quiet day at all. In fact, it may pick up some awards for being the craziest of them all.

Until then!

with love....

peaceful Wednesday

A very early wake up. A little deliberate (I have a very early appointment), but also unpleasantly provoked: Ed came in, and soon a cat started complaining, very loudly, that it was shut out of the room. Annoying cat.

Wait. I never want to complain about the cats. We dont keep a litter box (they go outside) and they aren't destructive. And most importantly, they have reduced the farmette mice population from great abundance to zero. You dont know how awful mice can be until you have to live with them. Talk about a destructive little beast! And the smell! The disease! So, I love our cats. Except when they complain loudly at being shut out.

The morning walk is so pretty! It's our first real-summer-weather day! Warm and a bit muggy. Yes, there are bugs, but we've seen worse. A few more ticks than usual, but again -- manageable. And the sun is so lovely! You want to sing out a good morning to all the plants that are waking up to its gifts!

(I've looked at life from both sides now...)

(From up and down...)

 

(...and still somehow...)

 

Appointment at 7:10 -- then quickly done. Honestly, I've had such a good run of med/dental visits. Even the dental hygienist was full of compliments (yesterday) -- a rare thing, since these guys always complain that you dont do enough for your teeth. I have changed none of my habits for the past twenty years, but still, this time she was all smiles.

By 7:45 I am at Madison Sourdough to pick up bread for Ed and treats for breakfast. They dont open until 8, but I dont mind sitting outside and waiting, taking in the activities of a bakery cafe staff preparing to open up. It reminds me of the years I was on the baking team at L'Etoile. The one that made croissants and gougeres for the market. There's something delicious about starting your day with sticking cheese puffs and viennoiseries (croissants, pain au chocolat) in the oven, though I'm sure glad I am on the buying end these days. Those early bakers hours are brutal! 

Okay, open!

I pick flowers from our meadow for our table. Time for breakfast!

Since it's going to be a hot day, I need to refresh the annuals in the tubs and refill all the drinking stations for the animals. This always takes longer than you'd think, because along the way I study the garden and do some spot weeding and chipping when I notice trouble spots (I always notice trouble spots). And again, because it is the first really warm day, I so enjoy feeling that sun on my still primed-for-winter back. There will soon come the day when I've had enough of the heat. But not this morning. 

In the early afternoon, Ed and I do a modest bike and hike. To our county park, where we walk the prairie, then pedal back again.

And then I have the most leisurely and awesome couple of hours on the porch, with my computer and my friend. In Poland. Because she sweetly matches up with my schedule and I a tiny bit with hers and you would never know that we live at a seven hour time delay. 

Toward the end of our Zoom chat, the winds pick up outside. Say what? Were we supposed to have storms? Isn't this Wednesday -- the day for Ed's bike ride? Didn't I water plants this morning in anticipation of a hot dry spell? The weather can be like a small child -- calm one minute, in tears the next. Never mind. It was warm, it was beautiful. The rest is trim.

with love...

Tuesday back to quiet

In humming to myself the song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" (for obvious reasons -- I'm running low on time today once again), I paused for a second and tried to recall who sang and wrote that song. I'm sure I knew it from Judy Collins. Here:

 

Let me flash the last verse for you, in case you're in no position to listen right now:

So come the storms of winter

And then the birds of spring again

I have no fear of time

For who knows how my love grows?
And who knows where the time goes?

I didn't know anything about the woman who wrote it -- Sandy Denny -- which is strange as I've always loved folk-pop music and never more than in the years she was writing and recording. I suppose it's because I lived in a near music vacuum when the song was released in 1969. Those were my Warsaw years and western music trickled in ever so slowly, randomly, a song here, a song there. Strawberry Fields (1967)! Then silence. Ruby Tuesday (1967) and again silence. Build Me Up Buttercup (1968), silence once more. Judy Collins, on the other hand, really picked up in popularity just when I reemerged in New York (as an au paire). Send in the Clowns hit the charts in 1973.  I'm reading that Sandy Denny died soon after, at the terribly young age of 31.

How do some lives become so twisted and complicated? Sandy (I read) suffered from depression and probably a lot of other ailments. A life cut short. And yet, out of nowhere, I picked up her song and here I am working in my flower fields and singing silently And then the birds of spring again, I have no fear of time, For who knows how my love grows? And who knows where the time goes?

Artists who die before their time do leave us their art. We forget about their maladies, we remember their canvases, poetry, music. Those of us without the gift of genius leave behind something else: images of how we were. Isn't that reason enough to make it a life's goal to try hard to make those images ones we can be proud of?

My morning walk:

Breakfast:

Weeding. Appointments. Errands. Mowing. (Missing in there is "cherry picking" -- better get to it tomorrow, or else the birds will win.)

 

 

 

And just like that, my day is nearly done. Who knows where the time goes, who knows where the time goes...

Let's salvage just a little of it by putting ourselves someplace new-ish. We read about it in the local paper -- there's a newly constructed building, called  the Black Business Hub (which seeks to house small startups and businesses run by Black and minority entrepreneurs), that has a Tuesday market of Black pop ups and food vendors -- mostly selling prepared foods. Sounded good in the paper. We got on the motorcycle and rode off to it.

It was a disappointment in that there was only one vendor -- a delightful one, aided by her granddaughter -- but just one, selling two foods: catfish hoagies and beef something or other.

We picked up a hoagie, though it was richly seasoned and mayo-ed, and so we are likely to nibble a little and call it a day. No matter, I can add a veggie frittata to the supper menu!  I do hope the Hub market fills with more vendors over time. The article indicated as much. Fingers crossed.

Monday, reasonably quiet

Here's something that caught my eye at Grace Cafe in McFarland this morning:

And here's the frustration I felt with humanity when I read it (and that includes myself -- last I heard, I was part of humanity): we all think we are kind. That we practice it, live it, breathe it. When my mother was still having more or less normal conversations on the phone with me, she would say, as if she meant it: it's important to be kind. The implication was that she practiced this herself. Though she didn't give examples of it, I felt that she very much placed herself in the category of "people who are kind."

And don't we all do this! We remember the smiles we dished out and forget the cruel nastiness that surely escaped every now and then. If we were glaringly unkind, so that we couldn't fool ourselves into believing otherwise, we tell ourselves, and others -- well, they deserved it! As if our unkindness was merely born of self preservation. Punch out, or die!

In my experience, the people whom I think of as genuinely kind are not blind to their occasional lapses. They know their strengths, their weaknesses, and they never give up trying to do better, even when no one seems to notice or care. If they slip up, they recognize what went wrong. They're mindful, observant, they listen, and yes, they smile at you. And maybe they'll read that sign to be kind and think to themselves -- okay, a smile is needed here, let me deliver.

Now, what was I doing early in the morning at a McFarland Cafe? Well, it had actually been a trying morning. My mother called many, many times with the usual stuff, though inserted in her litany of complaints was one that I did need to address. Not that doing so would help improve her outlook on the world, but still -- fixing that one glitch was important and it did occupy a good chunk of my time today. Feeling somewhat sympathetic to all that was thrown at me from before I was even fully awake, Ed asked -- want to bike over to that coffee shop in McFarland for breakfast?

And so after a brief walk to feed the animals...

(there is one day lily plant that forgot it's not yet July!)

(look what else is about to burst into a sea of purple, right behind the barn!)

(let me not neglect the Bresse hens...)

... we got on our bikes and headed... east! Over the river and through the woods...

It's such a nice ride. Easy, too. McFarland is only about a half hour bike ride from the farmhouse. And the morning is nippy but beautiful!

The coffee shop is spacious and colorful...

 

 

 ... but it's such a brilliant day, that we take our croissants and drinks to the outside table -- me, warming up in the sun, Ed, sticking to the shade.

 

 

 

And I said as much -- isn't this simply the best? These are words that always lead us to the same reflection, which honestly, isn't totally unrelated to my earlier mention of kindness: we are all not grateful enough. For what we have in life. Focusing too much on that what is missing. (To bring it back home, my mother can get incensed, absolutely incensed that an aide will not run to her room and bring her a missing cookie from the tray the minute she presses the emergency call button. Dont even ask how many times in the course of the day she presses that button. You;re guessing twenty? Thirty? You are off by a lot.)

Ed and I both lived for long spells in places that had no plumbing (me, at my grandparents' village home, Ed -- in the woods, for a few months, in Tennessee, then in an old farm in Wisconsin. Also without plumbing) and so we always bring it back to the toilet: you don't appreciate on a daily basis your toilet, do you? What if you had to live without one for a while? (Because so many people do...)  Go use an outhouse in the winter on a regular basis. You get to really love your shower and the modern waste management system.

It's hard to practice gratitude. You say the right words, think the right thoughts and then the next minute  you go back to griping about not getting good service at a restaurant, or a child's loud voice on an airplane, or your colleague's better parking spot allocation at work. Never mind that you sat down and had a whole meal prepared for you, and yes, you were once that child with a loud voice, and hey, it's a parking spot. For a car. That you drive. As opposed to horse and wagon, on the coldest days of the winter.

Ed and I talked, too, about slavery and communism and authoritarian autocrats and religion. And toilets. That's what happens when you step out of the quiet of a farmhouse life.

I then spent the whole morning on taking care of my mother's stuff, with only a short break for more pleasant readings. The afternoon? Appointments. Remember, I over-scheduled myself.

In the evening, Ed's engineering friends, including the Polish young man and his very pregnant wife, are here for a supper of take-out Thai. The good thing about these people is that they are young and charming and totally pleasant to be with. We ate on the porch. A little cool, but still -- so very beautiful.

 

 

 

Not such a quiet day maybe, but stunning in its simple, late spring beauty.