Update

Mom and I had seven hours in the car to spend together yesterday, and since it was Sunday, we couldn't talk business. This is a dangerous combination.

By the time we got home, we had (mentally) landscaped the entire 3/4 acre of yard that we call our own. The shady back corner was denuded of weeds, the deck acquired a wooden loggia for better growing of wisteria vines, and the underdeck area became a patio. We also screened out the neighbors with a healthy thick hedge of arbor vita (we already have one of these on the east side of the lawn) and inserted a fish pond. Then we had a friendly argument about whether or not the fish pond should be big enough to swim in ("It's unsanitary!" "It is not." "You want to swim in a muddy hole with fish?" "That depends. How are we defining 'muddy hole?'" etc.). We came up in favor of foot-paddling, but not swimming. Daddy says he doesn't want a swimming pool, anyway.

By the time we were finished, we had assembled both my brothers' caregroups and all Mom's former students for a garden-building party in July, and shook mental hands on the bargain.

Then we got home. Since it was only 5:30 PM or so, Mom invited me to our local nursery for a little action. Johnsons smells like heaven. I'm not kidding. I could feel each separate muscle in my back loosening up. I think I grew an inch, and I'm pretty sure my lungs expanded. We selected tomato plants and lobelia (see picture above), petunias and creeping vervain, and sproutlings whose names I don't remember. I dipped my hands in fountain water and touched every kind of leaf: smooth, furry, fragrant, or just plain green.

When we got home, I sat on the deck and crumbled potting soil rich as velvet between the blooming flora in their new planters. Daddy poured dirt for us and trotted out glasses of iced Zinfandel wine. Eventually, we grilled hamburgers and ate them right there, admiring the newly-planted railing boxes.

Well, that was splendid. But when we got up this morning, Mama was sick (which hardly ever happens). Apparently, she caught a bug or something from somebody in NC. Marjorie appeared at my door at 9:30 AM to ask if I could teach Latin in Mom's place at 11:00. It was Latin I, so I said yes. What delight, to revisit such concepts as the conjugation of possum and the formation of present passive infinitives! I am not overly fond of Jennys as a Latin curriculum, but my, we had fun! I even got to tell them about Pyramus and the leaky pipe. It was blissful, especially after I decided (five minutes before class began) that there was no sense in freaking out about being the teacher instead of the student. So I didn't and they didn't and we had a glorious hour, with me throwing detailed grammar questions at anyone who wasn't paying attention, a la Dr. Noe. Quite effective, I might add.

By the time we got through that, Daddy and Grandpa had finished planting the tomatoes. Daddy and I went food shopping (after hitting up Starbucks for frappuchinos and immersing ourselves in a discussion of literature: its definition, function, and end), got home, put the food away, and went up to visit Mama. I spent a delightful half-hour chatting with them and showing them my Kamien book from Music Appreciation, which I want to use as our spine Music book for high school Tapestry. They were delighted with it, and this pleased me muchly.

Then Burgee and I sat down to make spinach-and-cheese manicotti (she had been baking cookies for the past hour, but it was time to start dinner). We toughed it out over a mess of greenish goo and floppy empty noodles, and had to use pastry stuffers in the end, and Marjorie dubbed the filling "Oobleck." But, once we had them stuffed and baked in tomato sauce, they were scrumptious!

Mummy is asleep now, and Daddy is reading aloud to Burgee on the deck (which is right under my windows). I will finish this up and then go work out, shower, read a little Vanity Fair (Thackeray) perhaps, and fall asleep. In between everything else already mentioned, I have weeded and gotten repeatedly dirty, and read part of the script for Cyrano, and part of Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices (I'm falling in love with Puritan works all over again). I have lost seven pounds or so over the last few weeks, and am getting quite tan.

Love to all!
- Me