Simple Pleasures

The wind is blowing ever so slightly out there, outside my window. A small airplane hums; I can hear it but not see it. I can hear the saw of our neighbor next door, working on something. All faint, these sounds, quiet and purposeful.

All shades of green and gold and brown, amber, yellow, burnt orange, lime, umber - all flick and swish and quiver in the wind. Massive trees and new young trees, against the best kind of Northwestern sky. Dove grey, pale blue, soft light.

New shelves adorn my office, thanks to my husband.

Wait - holy anachronism, Batman! A ginormous stretch limo, black with a pale pearly gray top, just drove past my idyllic view. Turned down Benefit Street. Wow. Who was in there? Why are they out in a stretch limo on a sleepy fall Sunday afternoon, in our quiet little neighborhood?

Well. Now. Where was I?

Too late, I'm off on a limo wonder. It's turning the other corner now, heading out of site. Did a neighbor get a new job as a driver? Coming to show his family his new gig? Did someone get rich and decide to celebrate in a really weird way?

Anyway. Maybe it's a good reminder of pleasures that are not so simple. That take way more gasoline than that crow who just swooped by. That smell differently than the fall bouquet I had so much fun making an hour or so ago (dark green shiny laurel, fading red tree branch, orange & green & yellow & red maple, bright golden wisteria curling on long brown twisty branches, a pale yellow sunflower, a bright gold sunflower, hydrangea turning deep wonderful maroon, and one lone cornflower blue hydrangea to remind me of summer).

And now there is a house to clean, laundry to fold, a bed to make up with fresh sheets. And a dinner to make for friends coming over. Fish and sausage and chicken on the grill, squash, brown rice sauteed with red and yellow and green peppers and the last of the basil and green beans.

It is our first fall here in Seattle since 2006. Three years.

I am in love with my home.



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New Trees

A Summer of such busy-ness draws to a close... much producing, some teaching, lovely weeks of family time in Ohio - including a big family "withunion" as my son named it, a baptism, Cedar Point fun, the Henry County Fair, and more food than I probably should have eaten...

and a Fall full of challenges peeks at me from around the cooling corner...

The view from my window is sunny at the moment, trees still green, front yard browned from a summer of some blasting heat here in Seattle. There's a new tree with two trunks growing up and obscuring the mailbox, coming out of an old stump that we took for dead.

I am feeling some creative stirrings that I hope will become a new tree, or two even.

My son starts kindergarten one week from today. After a spring of research and worry and conviction that we'd wait a year, wait 'til 6, for kindergarten, he went and had a big old growth spurt this summer - not just physically, of course, but more essentially emotionally and psychically. No more fear on the playground at the park, but rather quiet confidence. Interest in other kids and openness to playing with them. Full sentences to adults, "Please may I have that, Mommy?" - "No, I don't like that, Mommy." Processing complex thoughts and questions and possible solutions. And then, after witnessing all that, a call from Leschi Elementary, that he'd leapt off the waiting list and into their Montessori program - so, one week from today, we're going to give a go. See what happens. Hope for the best.

My husband looks ahead to a new hip sometime this fall. More on that later.

Me - I hope for a new laptop, so that I can write anywhere in the world again. I look at the UW Extension Writing Certificate Programs, and I think I might just dive into a year of Popular Fiction... two years ago, I was all set to take the year-long Non Fiction courses when the job and move to San Diego kicked that idea out of commission. And now I think I have another chance - but I'm less drawn to Non Fiction these days. I want to write a novel. One that sells a gazillion copies. And makes me lots and lots and lots of money. So I can buy a house and take care of my family.

It's nice to be clear on that.

And yes, I will apply for some jobs so that I can earn money while I work on that big dream. I'm having a little trouble motivating towards those shorter term steps, but I promise I'll settle down and get to it, tomorrow. And do some grant writing, too.

But now it's time for lunch. Reading a play this afternoon. Maybe one I'll act in this winter...

I'm growing a new tree, or two maybe, I think.



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