Tumbledown's In the Pink

Listen! Can you hear them, too? :)

It's a magnificent day here in the village, and the purple phlox in my Tumbledown garden is in fierce and fragrant bloom. :)

These flowers can send my memories back to childhood summers faster than anything, I think. While my mother worked and weeded and worried over hers, I would pick the single blossoms and play them like fairy trumpets, tasting their sweet centers on my lips.

I don't work much where my own garden is concerned. I rarely weed it and I mostly don't worry over it. I simply watch it with wonder.

I know it deserves the kind of strict attention that my mom would administer, and I hope it realizes that I would give this if I could. I can't. Our time together is more Quality than Quantity as there are other magickal things I watch with wonder, too.... I imagine my phlox telegraphing to me, "No problem! It's the thought that counts, lovey." And then going on to whisper, "We prefer to be wild and wonder-full anyway."

Sweet!

Me too. :)
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Long-Distance Love -- :)

What could she be thinking, I wonder... :)

I recently had one of 'those' days: migraine filled and vise-like, oppressive and pressurized. I couldn't read, I couldn't draw. I became fixated on water.... I drank gallons of it and retained it spectacularly.

I should've guessed that my agony had something to do with the barometric pressure; most people feel approaching weather changes in their bones, but I think I feel them in my head. Either that or too many sun-filled days and I just spin a storm from my pain.

In any event, I went to bed that night exhausted and medicated only to have flashes of lightning on my eyelids interrupt my dreams and wake me. Having heard no thunder I half believed I'd dreamed the lightning, too, so I went outside in the dark and sat on the front step in my nightshirt. Sure enough -- a barrage of lightning flashes illuminated some distant clouds like a strobe. Just heat lightning, perhaps, as there were still twinkly stars in the sky. I went back to bed.

After my alarm sounded in the morning I curled under the covers with Boo and watched the sky outside my window darken dramatically. My headache had vanished and the storm had arrived at last! Windows were thrown open then to hear every thunder crash and catch every rain-freshened gust. Coffee was brewed. A candle was lit....

The household pets (the ones that respond to my alarm every morning with 'feed me!' cries) had interpreted the gloom as a return of the night and they hunkered down to sleep once more. My book-filled living room was still and shadowy. I watched as rain filled the street with a pool of swirling water that bubbled and frothed at the curb as it fed into the grate there faster than the storm sewer could accept it. I saw leaves and road flotsam caught in the eddies like fairy boats. I thought of my kids and days long ago when the three of us would be at that same window watching a similar scene....

And just then my phone gave a ping!: a text from my Eldest in California, asking was I available for a video chat. In my head I immediately thought, "She felt my vibes! She's on my frequency!" :)

And when our computer cameras connected, who should I see on the screen but my newest grandbug, front and center, responding to my face with coos and clicks and smiles. I talked to her and she listened. Then she talked to me and I listened. (Did you know that fairybabies have secrets they only tell their granny oddmothers? Well, they do!) I learned all about her recent camping adventure and how she was so keen on not missing a moment of it that she kept her poor parents awake the entire trip! :)

The storm wore itself out about the time our conversation ended. My little bug went off to nap and I went off to draw, thinking fondly of family and fairybabies. And the technological wizardry that can now connect us across the miles.
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Sooner Than Expected

My gardens are welcoming this evening's surprise shower. I am too. It's so light and unexpected that it has slipped under the radar of even the newscasters.

That being said, the computer is off now. The lamps are lit, the paper is out, and the pencils are warm. Time to hunker down and get cozy!
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A Welcome Sight

My over-the-sink shelf's most recent acquisition: a cicada husk and the hint of rains to come. :)
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Just What the Doctor Ordered

I happily kept my 3-year-old grandbug for a bit yesterday to give her mama a little break.

Her visit was just what I needed.

In the few hours we were together she and I built a castle out of Legos. We watered the parched and yellowed pea plants in the weedy raised bed. She 'painted' the old weathered fence by spraying it with the garden hose. And I packed her a snack for the road....

Before our walk she helped me count quarters into dollars. (Me: "Do you know what a quarter is?" She: "Yes. It's a circle with a picture on it.") Then I loaded her into the stroller and the two of us headed off together to see a neighbor's chickens before traveling on into town for some lunch.

On our way we passed a garage sale in progress, and there on the curb was an old-fashioned wooden school desk. Avery spied it immediately and craned her neck to study it as we passed. "Oooooh," she said. "Gramma, I sure like that big kids' chair!" I did, too. And I spent the rest of our walk figuring out how I could possibly buy it and where to put it if I did....

I bought her a burger and fries and an orange drink with the quarters we'd counted, and she curled up in a booth and stirred her ketchup with one finger. I helped myself to her fries.

"Gramma!" she scolded, her brows knit together. "You ate one of my fries. You're supposed to say, 'please, can I have a fry.'"

I said, "Oh, I see. Please, can I have a fry?"

Instant cheer. "Sure, Gramma; you can have TWO fries! Here, I'll dip them in ketchup for you!" So generous. :)

We took a different way home, primarily to avoid the garage sale. (I didn't have the heart to pass the desk again and see her longing for it....) Her mama was waiting for us when we arrived. I'd hardly unbuckled her from the stroller and accompanied her inside before the poor thing melted down spectacularly. I said, "Uh-oh, I think someone's tired." And she said, dramatically, "Gramma, I am SOOOOO tired!!" 

And apparently I was, too. Because after she left I went inside and crashed. I slept until dark! And there was no reason for it. It wasn't like we'd spent those hours climbing trees or running races. I think I was just exhausted from the effort of being In The Moment. 

I wish sometimes that my brain was a DVR and that every time I'm with my grandchildren I could just press the 'rec' button and make each visit into a memory movie. Wouldn't that be the best?? I could just relax then, knowing that it would all be there for me to replay over and over again.... Maybe then our visits wouldn't tire me out so much....

Anyway, when I woke, I realized I'd wasted an entire afternoon sleeping when I could have been working. And then I corrected myself: no part of my day was a waste.

It was all dipped in holy gold.
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I'm Having Issues

Posts haven't been added to the Maily lately because I've been having problems with it.... The format isn't behaving for me at all. I can't edit, make changes, or even post pics. Boo....

I'm sure this is all due to User Error, so this afternoon I plan to have my tech-savvy James (the Computer Whisperer) check everything out and offer his suggestions. If nothing can be done, the Maily will be moving elsewhere (any suggestions? Wordpress?) and I'll give you a heads-up so you can move there with me.

In the meantime, have a great Weekend Eve, my friend. Yes, I know it's Friday the 13th but it's still a Friday, and Fridays are THE best day of the week, bar none.

So let the happydance begin! :)

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Fairypost

There it is. Over there. Rolled up in that typewriter, unfinished. Closed up in that spiral notebook. Waiting in that sketchpad.

 

Or perhaps it's still in that fountain pen or that stub of a pencil. Or maybe even still in that room in your imagination.

 

And it's calling to you, isn't it? "Those dishes can wait... that rug is fine.... Come play!"

 

And you want to. Anyone would.

 

But there are things that can't wait. Responsibilities that are more than just dishes that need washing and a rug that needs vacuuming.

 

Those words over there understand. They really do. So does that half-finished drawing, with its twinkly eyes and shy smile. They're just children. And they want All You all the time!

 

And you remember how hard it is to wait, right? But it makes the reunion that much sweeter.

 

And just think of all the stuff you'll share then!

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Happy Independence Day, America!

Art copyright Norman Rockwell

In my head, July 4th always looks like a classic Americana painting.

 

There are horse-drawn carriages and surreys with fringe, men in straw boaters riding impossible bicycles, and women in high button shoes carrying parasols. 

 

There are girls with bows in their hair waving pinwheels, and boys in short pants pushing hoops along the street with sticks. 

 

And they all live in a pretty town full of stately homes sporting swags and buntings and poles with flags, and windowboxes overflowing with red, white, and blue petunias.

 

There's a town green, too (of course). With a white bandstand (is there any other?). And a barbershop quartet sings there today, serenading the townsfolk who are gathered for an ice cream social. And the mayor makes a speech first. He's the one with a mustache so big that it's the only thing that moves when he talks, and his vest with its watch chain stretches taut across his big stomach.

 

And at some point a band will play a march and hotdogs will be served, flags will be saluted and allegiances will be pledged. And at dusk the kids will wave sparklers and watch the sky for fireworks.

 

Yep. That's my version of the 4th of July. Something right out of Disney's Main Street USA, apparently! :)

 

Whatever your version of the 4th is, have a safe one, my friends.

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