The Loveliest Bit

Hello, reader.
Kind of you to stop in.

I haven’t visited myself much lately. Been feeling more…private. Maybe it is a bit of whiplash from the speed of social media, maybe it’s a season or something else; I’m not sure. But I’m keeping words closer. I don’t go out as much anymore and I am thankful for this. Maturity or fatigue? Conversations keep more of a reality to them. Though the other week an old friend from VA came through town for a Friday night and we ended up in an alley with some of my friends, dancing in a spray painted square on the asphalt before hitting one last night spot, where the entire (and I mean ENTIRE) crowd broke into a spontaneous sing-a-long of the Cardigans’ “Lovefool” even as the bouncers turned the lights on and ushered patrons out the doors. It was the loveliest bit of fluff.

My new awesome job has me working nonstop (she says, as she pauses between emails to write this post) and my big trips start next week when I fly to Dallas. The next three months are straight gameface time. I’m already tired just in the preparation but I’m thoroughly enjoying what I do. It has pulled me away from writing, but I think I’m just using that as an excuse. Writing scares me as much as it saves me. It calls out to others in the storm while forcing me to realize the storm exists.

My sweet Patsy Cline had puppies two weeks ago. This was unexpected, shocking, miraculous, totally gross and several other words associated with the miracle of life. I’ve drafted a post on this, roughly entitled “What to Expect When Your Whore Dog Is Expecting” but that is for another blog site. I’ll let you know if it comes out funny. I don’t tend to be funny in writing; don’t know how to translate the timing required for humor into paragraph form.
There is more, as there is every spring. I’m basking in the drama-free, in the regretless day, in the intentional and the lovely. I spend part of my day staring at 6 sleeping puppies. Life in abundance.

“April this year, not otherwise
Than April of a year ago,
Is full of whispers, full of sighs,
Of dazzling mud and dingy snow;
Hepaticas that pleased you so
Are here again, and butterflies.” –E. St.V. Millay, Song of Second April, v1

Circle Round

Last weekend I had a group of 20-some friends from far and wide join me in a brewery tour around Asheville. It was bright and 75 degrees and, since 5 breweries are within walking distance, it was a casual adventure in matching green shirts.
This photo, taken by the incomparable Jane, reminds me that I am surrounded by love.
Such a joy, these people!

Perpetual Spring

For my friend Leslie’s 32nd birthday a few weeks ago she had a few of us join her in a desperate housewives takeover of a local tattoo parlor. She was getting her nose pierced, others were actually getting tattoos.
I don’t have any tattoos; I went to get one back in 2001 and thankfully the shop was closed or I may have gotten something I later regretted. However this recent trip planted the idea in my head of getting some ink. My reasoning goes back to my previous post: “Sweetness Follows”: I know that this season in my life is so beautiful and delicious but also extremely fleeting and wholly temporary. It will end, and end sooner than I’d hope. I see these little seasons passing and some I handle better than others.
Some end because of distance. Some end because the changes that happen are too great to overcome. Some end because expectations diverge. Some end because hearts can’t agree. Some end because of death.
Whatever the reason, the feeling is the same. There is a sense of loss right now but I am reminded of two plants in this instance: the American chestnut and the resurrection fern.
When the chestnut succumbs to the blight, the stem/trunk is killed off, but the roots remain. Those roots will continue to send up new stalks of growth with the constant hope that a few will survive. Often you’ll observe a large, dead stump, sometimes 75 years gone, with dozens of tiny chestnut shoots surrounding it. The roots don’t know when to give up and as long as they stay firmly planted, those new growths will continue.
The resurrection fern shrivels up and appears dead when resources wane and droughts appear, but at the first sign of rain it unfurls in a fit of lush green optimism. It is as if it lives in this perpetual spring of new beginnings. It is proof that life, promises and blessings are new every morning if we choose to let them be.

Daffodils

January lied to the daffodils.

They are the embodiment of hope springing eternal; those fresh green shoots bursting through the frosted terra firma of endless winter.

And January has lied to them.
Daffodils think their time has come, they think this week is March and that it is safe to emerge and announce the return of life.

But they are wrong.
Because between now and the relative safety of March lies the tempest of February.
They will freeze.
It is only a matter of time.
January has lied to all of us.
And January doesn’t care.

"Set the foot down with distrust on the crust of the world--it is thin." -Edna