I spent the last week of August, in Elizabeth City.  It was the week just before Lyla started second grade.

It was hot, but we did manage a  walk , one morning.  We walked to a playground, which sadly, is always deserted.  The route is not as scenic as the walk to the “laughing river,  and it was  longer- but childhood days dwindle with a harsh speed and a playgound  will -in a twinkling,  lose its’ ” shine”  for my little grand darlings

.Another day, we made a “magic cake”.  Brynn, who loves to crack eggs,  was quite disappointed when I had her watch me instead, for the recipe called for meringue, which meant the eggs had to be separated . . she was not impressed with the process.  I had Lyla measure the ingredients for the meringue and handed her the mixer. It takes a while for the meringue to form.  We offered Brynn a turn, but she had forsaken us to play with a doll. I kept telling Lyla to watch the bowl, for the magic.  Moments later. she let out a gleeful shriek-and Brynn tossed the doll and came running. That mess in the bowl was now creamy and fluffy.  I took a chance and turned the bowl upside down as my mother used to.  This alarmed the girls at first-but the meringue stayed put and they were in awe.  After that, Brynn hung around to fold the meringue gently into the batter while Lyla beamed with satisfaction, at her grand accomplishment.

I came back to Bonnet street on Saturday morning, with a bit of melancholy about the climax of summer leisureB with the girls so I did what I always do, I went to work.   . . .I made home made  ravioli one day.  I baked bread one morning and worked in the yard with fervor every day.  I made scented pinecones this same week.

  A dear friend of mine, from Elizabeth City, came to see me one day. Laney and I met . through Miss Thelma, Jennys’ 93 year old neighbor. We became” fast friends”.  I admire Laney.  She cares for her ailing husband, and still finds time to help others.  We have many shared interests . . .plus she has chickens!  I always love people with chickens, it seems.  We had a lovely time.

Brynn and Ryan have September birthdays, so everyone gathered to celebrate,  last weekend. Brynn turned five, and Ryan turns four.  Delightful ages, I think.  Little Banks is walking with some assistance and will climb anything.  He sat on the porch for a while, examining fallen leaves . There was a beautiful sense of silent  wonder as he explored their texture and scent .  I felt like I was watching something beautiful.

 I do not disturb the children when they are discovering nor when they are imagining.  There are so many things to hinder the ability to concentrate deeply- for all of us-and I fear this is actually harmful.  When Ryan is building his castles or the girls are tending to their dolls . . . I leave them alone . .  to the wonderful business of childhood.

 “Out of the  blue”, my friend, Rae invited me to run an errand with her, one early morning.  I agreed as long as I didn’t have to get out of the car, for my house dress  already had splotches of dirt and water here and there.  I rode with her to pick up wild honey from a local beekeeper.  As it turns out, I recognized him as the parent of students I had taught.  A few days later, our friend Sara came  by and so Rae, Sara and I made another trip to the beekeeper.  This time, I was cleaned up and ready.  What a delightful time we had -and I am thrilled to have wild spring honey in my kitchen. ( I use honey in my coffee-and all my baked goods.)

Glory be!  It rained one afternoon!  The sunrise was dim,  that day with only a few rays of muted light splattering across a pale  sky.  Rain came a few hours later and I declare listening to it fall, acted like a tonic on me.  Since that enchanting afternoon, the air has been much cooler and a brisk breeze has blown steadily and merrily.

It has been many years since I have had  the liberty to truly celebrate the occasion of September. To immerse myself in its’ misted, silvery dawns and its’ bright and shining afternoons.   Oh! to watch the first of the falling leaves and then, there are the  moths “on the wing” in the twilight hours.   .I have always loved September. .

Finally . . .  the rain came.  It has been a while since the watery music of a rainfall .

  Now, everywhere seems to be having some kind of weather.  The rabbitpatch on Bonnet street has been  through a hot and dry spell.  The gardenias will testify to that.  If I had a dollar  for every bucket of water I have carried, thus far . . .

In August, summer flowers fade, anyway.  I have a few pinks still blooming.  One gardenia, still has the gumption to bloom and rewards my efforts with its’ lovely fragrance  , still.  The young butterfly bushes are the only ones not complaining, nor   . . the stalwart phlox, by the backdoor.

Now, the roses lack any boast.  They are alive , and after a hot drought, that is something. There are about a dozen of them growing along a fence.  They are a “motley crew”, gathered from clearance shelves, and folks who were landscaping and tossed them in a rubbish pile.  I did  buy two, that produce three colors of roses.  Usually, roses rally at the first sign of cooler weather.  Time will tell, as it always does.

On Monday, sister Delores and niece Dana came.  We gathered at Mamas’ for the noonday meal.   They are moving to the coast, where Dana will be attending college.  Life has become very busy for them, with the move and college looming ahead.  On account of this, we decided a leisure visit, was in order.

The next day one of my dear friends of several decades stopped by.   We enjoyed  a small lunch while we talked about our grandchildren, figs, flowers and pottery.  Sara and I have a lot in common. The day was so hot-over a 100 degrees- that we did not linger on the traditional stroll around the yard.   Being born and raised in the south, does not make one a fan of hot weather.

I can tolerate heat, I work outside some everyday .   I always have   and when I was a child, children came in to eat-otherwise we were outside, but this is not heat of the yesteryears.  I remember that in 1979, the summer was awful.  I was restoring another old house, that year.  2015 was hot, that is the year that Lyla was born.

 I am in the mood to bake but this season is just  not conducive to sweet breads nor hearty soups. We eat salads and quick meals that do not make the kitchen any hotter.  I still cook in the early mornings, what can “rest” until evening.   Hence I am making pies. . .lemon, chocolate and custards.  When Sara came, she brought me a generous amount of figs, so that helped satisfy my yearning for “kitchen work”.  They are in the freezer now, waiting for Christmas. For me, it is never too early, to think about Christmas.

By mid week, I was back to carrying buckets of water and hanging clothes on the line.  I have to work on “unemployment” in some sort of way, several times a week.  Everything is on line and I am convinced   that many people are not able to navigate this system . I have had to ask for help several times.  . . . and what if one doesn’t have a computer?  If losing your job didn’t shake your confidence , , ,filing for unemployment, will.  I haven’t even looked for a job in 23 years !

None- the-less,  there is a sense of peace that abides in my heart and a sense of certainty that all is well.

Lyla starts school next week.  She will be in the second grade.  In light of that, I hope to get in a visit, this week.  We are going to make an old fashion “magic cake” and I will tell our story, for the doll community is thriving (by now, this could be a book).  I will watch the girls play with “Biscuit” that darling beagle and if it is cool enough, walk by the laughing river.

Just before I leave for Elizabeth City, I will water the flowers.  I have been working on the fence for almost two years now.  It was a bramble of thorns and poison ivy.  Those things can survive a drought. There was also some english ivy and honeysuckcle  . . . I let those grow- and there was another tender vine, that I wasn’t sure about.  The thing bloomed in late summer, last  year!   Little white and   very fragrant blossoms were a pleasant surprise.  I think it is a kind of jasmine. One little patch is blooming, right now.  . . I just might come home to  a delightful  garland of summer snow

I have been as busy as any “Honeybee” ever dared to be, since my last entry.  I have painted a large cabinet, several flower pots, framed flowers and leaves, I had pressed, last year and  did two paintings that turned out awful   . .still, I learned something from   my ill attempts, so I do not consider it was  a waste of time. 

The clothesline has had linens and soft, dresses on it most days and summer squash  has been celebrated several times. 

I had a visit with one of my dearest friends, one morning.  That was a lovely time. A friendship that spans thirty years is like a rare pearl . . .the size of the moon.  How blessed I am to have met her, when we were both young mothers.  Now, we are grandmothers.  I can always depend on intelligent discussions when we talk, yet when I kissed the first  flower of the season, from my grandmothers’ bulbs, on our departing stroll, around the yard and she didn’t bat an eye. . . we have never “put on airs”. 

 I have increased my strolls around the rosewood cottage.  The yard is really like a garden, theses days.  I walk at first light when the world is mostly silent.  Sometimes, I see the rabbit family nibbling on the fresh fruit and vegetable scraps that I leave out for them.  When they are finished, they hop merrily, down the middle of the street, “headed home”.  I chuckle every time.  During the day, I walk several times, stopping to pull grass or dead head spent blooms.    At dark,  I go out to say good night and send good night wishes to the world, I include the robins, cardinals, doves and squirrels that call this place home, too.  A streetlight was out last week, and I was sorry when it got fixed, for I was able the “dog stars”.  I wish street lights were the motion sensor kind . .but, at least now, I know where the dog stars shine. 

I day dream a lot.   . . intentionally.  I pretend all sorts of things, Some are ridiculous notions, others are “wishful thinking” Sometimes, I sit and “wonder” about a subject. (This often leads to a “study”, afterwards. )  .I take no shame in this delightful habit. . .after all, I kiss flowers. 

I do have some sensible hours . . ..l Have been going over the “shoestring budget”.  hence, I have returned to making everything I can.  I have a good supply of cleaning concoctions in labeled jars, accomplished one afternoon.  The collection is actually pretty to look upon and the smells are wonderful.  I felt so pleased . 

Just recently, it has become hot, on Bonnet Street, though we are not suffering  that dreadful  heat that I heard about in the news.

Oddly, my autumn joy  flowers are blooming and so are the chrysanthemums!  Everything is thirsty and so I spend hours carrying small buckets of water to each flower and bush.  I do not find this yard to be too small, these days.

 I have taken to cooking in the early morning.  Yesterday, I baked bread and oatmeal cookies, long before  dawn .  This practice, preserves a bit of  coolness and the air conditioner can use the assistance.  Box fans drone  through out the cottage, as well.  In the ladder hours of the afternoon, the heat is stifling, muggy and hateful.  Since I am not cooking, I read-or paint  I am reading a series called “The Cottage Tales”.  They are  based on the life of Beatrix Potter.  Of course the characters are rabbits and kittens and mice.  Their accounts are quite accurate , however, when it comes to “Miss Potters’  goings and comings”.   The books are well written, too. I am on a mission to surround myself with beauty and simple pleasures-and these books serve that purpose. 

I am back to reading works by Thoreau, in small doses ,for he makes me think deeply. 

Sometimes . . .all of these efforts work together and I feel almost  unscathed and delightfully, untethered. 

A few days ago, I was working in the yard.  Someone , stopped by and said “I am just so sorry”.  I said “about what?”.  She said “That you lost your job.”  “Oh yes!   I had forgotten.” I said  I laughed about that. 

Then again, on some days, I wake up in a state of bewilderment that losing my job DID happen.  I fall in that binding snare, “how in the world, will I make it financially?” . . the thing tightens.  Can a person survive on social security, alone?  My meager savings are pitiful.  Surely, I will never get hired any where. . .By now that snare, that was in plain sight,  is  very tight and So I escape . . . 

and go to visit with the pale blooms of the autumn joy.   . .that suprised me with flowers in June . . . against the odds.  God does not seem to   care about “the odds I start thinking,. . .and sometimes things happen “out of season   The beauty of this truth filled my heart. Maybe, out of season is just right timing . . .

My little grand daughters got a puppy a few days ago.  Lyla has been asking for a beagle for two years.  She would name  him “Biscuit”.  At long last, it has happened! Biscuit is adorable.  I hope to meet him this week. 

Baby Banks is crawling now and Ryan can sing “Jesus loves me” with accurate pitch- and change octaves!  So all of my grand darlings are doing well. . . . and actually, I am too.  

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It is long past :first light”, as I begin this entry.  I was pulling grass and weeds, at daybreak.  I am an early bird certainly, and tend to slow down as the day slips by. 

I dream big in the mornings- about weeding and  watering, laundry, hanging a birdfeeder and supper.  I am domestic at heart and derive such satisfaction from this work .  Home making is an art and everyone benefits from it.  Things are where they ought to be,  and the  fragrance of clean linens and sometimes a loaf of bread drifts like a song, sung from a happy heart, just inside the back door.  What a spectacular greeting, I think.  If I sound old fashioned, it is because I am.  As it turns out, this is a good thing . . . for today, I had an “exit interview” at the school, that I have worked at for 23 years.   I am still shocked.

It has been an unsettling affair-and heartbreaking, too. Some days I was “gloom and doom”.  I felt banished from something, I helped create.  The financial side of it was daunting.  “Faith the size of a mustard seed,” seemed too much to ask for . . .all has since passed. 

I gained strength from verses that came to me like  sudden showers.    Finally, a friend, wiser than me, asked “Is this a sunrise or a sunset?” That question sent a chorus of bells ringing and seemed to give me  clarity. Maybe, The “mountain” I had been building was just a mole hill and  not nearly as treacherous nor as foreboding , as I had made it out to be.  It was just unfamiliar territory .     Despite my clumsy attempt to “practice what I preach” and my fervor to collect fears of every sort . . .I now have that “peace that passes understanding”.  Perspective is a big factor. I guess, I took the long way around.

This new path will take some time and adjustment.  I do not worry about staying busy.  -nor feeling unfulfilled or a bit less passionate about life.  I do not know what to expect about the financial aspect-and I’m going to stop there, lest I build another mountain for I am good at that. 

So it is a good thing, that scrubbing, dusting and a clothes line give me joy, I think. . . and I might bake a cake on a Tuesday!  Well, time will tell, as it always does. No matter how much I clean the house, it never stays that way for long-and someone is always hungry, so I ought not to worry, that I will run out of this “hobby”.

Other than all that, Mama and I went to the lake last weekend.  We gathered to find out and then celebrate if niece Hayley,  was having a boy or a girl . . .  It is a little girl!  What a happy day! 

This weekend, I am in Elizabeth City with Jenny and the grand daughters.  (Will is out of town.) Lyla finished first grade and was awarded  academic achievements in math and reading, which made all of us happy-but she also received a character award and THAT to me, was the highest honor. Brynn, at four, completed her preschool year and she is glad, for she was “sick of hard work”!  Brynn does know her Bible stories, though . 

Will and Jenny are good parents and that means the world to me. Every visit, leaves me  more convinced of this blessing. I came home on a beautiful day , determined to live joyfully and to accept the blessings that I was too dull to imagine . .   .  I have seen a fair share of “silver  Linings “, after all. 

Now, when I started this diary, it was with the intentions to spread hope and comfort, hence writing about disappointment seems to go against that notion, but the truth is, as much effort as I put in to my own private world, disappointment wiles its’ way in, anyway.  We all come face to face with it at some time and so as heartbreaking as this  is to consider . . . so will my beloved children.  . .and they Are still watching. When they get knocked sideways I want them to have some strategy for recovery.  Stumbling about is not defeat, nor are moments of hopelessness.  And last, but not least,  Me, nor any other human are  fit for pedestals.  . . and especially me. 

I meant to write yesterday, but I have felt awful since Easter Sunday-and I could not conjure a single thought.  Besides that, I was not up before dawn, which is the most likely time for me to wander tenderly with my spirit.  Otherwise, my thoughts are as shallow as those of  a goldfish!   

Thank Goodness,  for the garden and old trees and April skies, for such things implore me to stop everything . . .and get still.  If all else fails, there are the church bells, and a friendly robin and a family of rabbits that visit.  Such things make me set down my bucket of water or stop digging, to take notice.

Recently, April was full of rainy days and then, bright days full of sunshine. I am a fan of weather, in general and find both kinds of days, lovely.

May

Now , May, the sweetest month,  has  arrived to fill the hearts of poets and farmers alike. As a child, May meant, little goats and foals would be born.  I still remember how we would all get up and scramble to the pasture , in a mad dash.

At school, I was more apt to “daydream” in May, which was considered sinful.  I would stare out the open windows and wonder which field, Pop was plowing and what  Grandmama was doing  in the kitchen. I could imagine Mama hanging out clothes on the line and sister Delores Ann, playing merrily .  I was always especially homesick in May.   . .and the school bus  seemed as “slow as molasses in January” on the ride home. 

I must have been born, “a homebody”, for I still prefer to be home.  “Home” is one of the few places left, where things make sense, to me. 

“Familiar” is getting more and more scarce, in this world-and what a shame. We no longer, second guess anything, but  instead go head over heels over “new”.  We ought to all stop or at least pause.  Needing quantity over quality is an insatiable quest.  Rushing about to get more  often means we settle for less.  Oh, I hope to choose wisely and recognize true values . . not what is easiest, nor shiniest, at the moment.

I have noticed, that when people reflect on their childhood, they tend to remember what happened often, mostly. . . not gadgets.  The fondest memories are not usually related to convenience.  They are  things like supper, and Sundays and whatever else that occurred until it could be deemed dependable.  Isolated, the details seem ordinary . . . yet we remember. 

I am a sentimental one and the value of things tend to stick with me.   

Maybe that is why I am so thrilled to have a clothes line!  Kyle put it up about a week ago and it truly looks adorable-that is right . . it is charming.  Fragrant flowers grow at the ends of it and a decorative birdhouse too.  It is a short line, but it does hold a set of sheets, nicely.  When I announced the installation of a clothes line to friends, many of them out right frowned.  I laughed about that, for I may be the only one left that enjoys the quiet work of hanging clothes on a line . . .while a mockingbird sings.

Sister Delores and niece Dana came this weekend.  On Sunday, we visited with Aunt Christine and Uncle Gene and our cousins. There were first, second and a third baby cousin all chatting and snacking together that sweet hour.  Before we left, Aunt Christine showed us her newly planted gardenias.  It was the icing on my cake. All of my life, a walk around the yard, to look at flowers, has been the conclusion to a gathering.  In my earliest memories, it was Mama Hodges’ yard.  I did not enjoy  the tour, as a child, for the women treated it like a ceremony and talked quietly as we we walked listening to the history of each flower while the children had to restrain movement lest we trample some holy specimen.   Some how. it has become a tradition and looking at Aunt Christines’ gardenias, made me remember. 

On Monday, Mama, Delores and Dana came to the Bonnet Street rabbitpatch.  I made coffee and they brought Mamas’ favorite cake, that Aunt Christine has presented as a parting gift.  Delores Ann sews and so we made plans for curtains for the rosewood cottage.  Dana is on break from school, as she graduated this past weekend.  She talked about her dreams and concerns about how to proceed in life. . . until Christian came in with some of his artwork.  That changed the conversation and the two of them were in another world, for the rest of the visit.  We did take a  walk around the yard.  Well, the yard is ever changing. 

Just this past week, I found the courage to remove an unsightly long row of hedges.  The things were covered in thorn vines and poison vines too.  Besides that, they were spindly, despite my many hours of labor.  I made sure there were no little nests and since there were not, I said “good riddance”.  Now sunlight falls , where shade used to. Birds and squirrels have been feasting on the contents of disturbed soil ever since.   I must settle on what the future holds for this broader and sunnier patch of earth, on the north side of the house.  I take this matter seriously and I contemplate by staring at the space til I am almost in  trance.  The boys are used to this habit and know exactly that I  am plotting, something that may involve them.  I have heard them sigh, at the sight of me contemplating.  Tres caught on to this quickly and  sometimes would deliberately interrupt. 

Meanwhile, the grand children are growing like dandelions-and I miss them.  The youngest flowers around the rosewood need watering and work is an especially busy place, these days.  Mama can drive, now,  Tres and Sarah have birthdays this month (the same day!) and I will continue to ponder the north garden . . .and make my biscuits. 

Sister Delores took a few pictures for me to share . . so you can watch my garden grow, too.  The relaxing rabbit sits upon an old bookcase, now with  a hinged top. Picnic supplies are stored inside.

The suitcase is unpacked and sits in its’ designated corner. 

Sister, Delores Ann, came on Tuesday and I returned to the little rappitpatch on Bonnet Street. It took a while to wash clothes and tend to the flowers, though the only one that complained was a young hydrangea.  Christian is a good housekeeper  and an outstanding friend to the boxer and the gray cat-but the small bed of “lily-of the-valley” were quite lonely, I noticed. 

The time that  I spent at Mamas’ was busy and rewarding . Mama trudged through her exercises, gallantly and impressed everyone.

Neighbors , family and friends came by dependably and helped out in various ways .  It was wonderful to visit with everyone. My own neighbors, at one time, cousins and an aunt and uncle, all came through out my stay making each day a sort of   reunion. 

April came and with it showers.  There has been wind, too.  I suppose March had to get in the last word.  With the weather having been unseasonably mild, there are flowers and trees blossoming all around. It is hard to top the pairing  of dogwoods and azaleas .  The spireas did not wait for Easter Sunday as their elders have always done-instead they took full advantage of the unusual conditions. and donned their delicate, but spectacular  flowers, early. 

For many years spireas were found in most every yard.  The bushes were well mannered and waited for the proper time (just before Easter) to bloom.  This allowed children with their “Easter dresses, patent leather shoes or coats and ties” to be photographed in a fairy land-like landscape. Mama remembers this tradition, fondly. 

The kids are coming  home for Easter.  I do not know now how an Easter meal, an egg hunt and a belated birthday celebration for Lyla will all fit in, but I am trying to convince myself that it will.  My Lyla turned 8 yrs old on one of  the early days of April.

She was a beautiful one and born on an Easter Sunday.  A young dogwood bloomed at the old farm  house, for the first time, on that day.  We brought her homes to quite a proper environment.  We played beautiful music, gave her candle light baths and spoke soft, beautiful words . . .she fussed anyway.. . a lot.  The only thing that comforted her was to take her outside, we discovered.  I spent a good deal of time under a crab apple tree in full bloom, with this child-til I declared her a fairy child . . .and a temperamental one at that.  Today, our Lyla is very artistic, bright and very compassionate. 

With a gathering in the very near future, Kyle helped me in  the yard.  Kyle is wonderful at yard work.  He enjoys it , from digging to mulching-and he doesn’t complain. We worked a day and a half and the yard looked like a young garden, when we were through.  I couldn’t wait for my children to see it.

I plant perennials that come back with their cousins and I prefer small blossoms, like pinks, thrift, candy tuft and the sweet dianthus- and   whimsical sages.  . . .Oh and roses!  I am quite a glutton when it comes to flowers.   I am just as bad about flowering shrubs.  I have a half dozen tea olives, seven gardenias and five azaleas-which bloom from spring to frost,  and several hydrangeas.  It is no wonder we are eating rice and beans!  

It was pouring rain, when they all arrived-it had been raining for hours.  The house was clean and the table was laden with dishes of food.  Grandmamas’ china with a dainty pale pink rose, was stacked and beside it cloth napkins.  What a lovely setting-just like the yard, they had all just dashed through-unaware of my pinks and dianthus! 

The meal was perfect and while Tres labored over the dishes, Sydney and the children decorated a cookie house with honeybees on it.   If I stepped in the dining room, shrieks rang out.  What an adorable little house they presented.  Each little face beaming with delight in their gift.  I beamed too. 

Brant hid eggs in the cottage, for it was still raining, while I read The Tale of Peter Rabbit” to the grand darlings and tied the easter bunny, eggs and Jesus together in a lesson.  Sydney had put  the scriptures’ account of the Christ, death, burial and resurrection, in numbered eggs, which we read together.  Lyla shed tears.  This moved me deeply.

 Afterwards, we all went to Mamas’ for the surprise party.  I had made an ice cream cake and Brynn presented Lyla with a bouquet of flowers. 

Through out the day, Baby Banks had been held nd adored by everyone of us.  He barely complained and smiled at every body til he was fast asleep in Mamas’ arms. 

That night, when the cottage was still, and Grandmas’ china   was back in the hutch, I replayed the precious details of the day and my heart was full.  Now, there was a beautiful memory that belonged to this rabbitpatch on Bonnet Street.  . . and suddenly the place felt more like “home”. 

All of my efforts to create a cozy, happy dwelling, paled in comparison to  our children building a cookie house at the dining room table, the drone of the male voices filling the air and the new babe cooing. 

I felt like ‘sugar plums were dancing in my head” as  I drifted off to sleep.  That was a good thing, for the next day was Easter Sunday at Mamas’ andI needed to be back in the kitchen before the robin sang. 

It was still raining, when I woke.

It is morning here as I write from the little rabbitpatch on Bonnet Street.  The air is cool and filled with the music of song birds.  First light has come, while most of the neighborhood slumbers. 

Though I remain a fan of rural living,  I am thankful that the town I live in is a small quiet one.   I realise now, that I grew up quietly.  If a car drove by, we all stopped what we were doing to wave.  The low rumble of a tractor is quite different from sirens . That is why I especially love morning time, in the town.  I could go on and on about such things , but too much has happened to  do so. 

I went to see Jenny and her family, last weekend.   I took a long walk with the little girls.  We stopped in to see “Aunt J, which was delightful.  She never fails to make me smile.  She is loving to  my daughter and grand children  and it does my heart good to know she is their neighbor. 

After that, we visited with the “laughing river”-my old friend.  We said hello to some pines whispering and to daffodils blooming.  We saw a bluebird who perched and watched us, too.  It was a happy time, for me. The river was shining and sapphire blue.  I always feel like the river remembers me, when I visit.

I came home and went back to work on the huge storage cabinet, newly built. It is finally finished and neatly stocked with all sorts of treasures-photographs, a few toys, my journals spanning several decades, the baby dress I came home in, Kyles’ piggy banks, the bunny that Tres slept with-tokens of precious memories.  The only thing in it, that I have no attachment to is “the business box” . 

Yesterday, I gave the cottage a deep cleaning for at last those horrid cardboard boxes were out of the house and the paint and sawdust too.  

The work week arrived, and with it the routine.  The weather here has been acting like spring for a solid month and so I am working outside, at school, in little gardens, which thrills me. 

Everyone was happy at the arrival of spring in early February.  Most every day the temperature was 70 degrees- and a lot of days 80!  The birds got busy and Miss Sylvias’ irises, now planted, just out the kitchen door of the rosewood cottage, are blooming.  It has been windy since long before March.  Any minute, folks will be picking strawberries. I find  the weather lovely . . but quite  unnatural-and I am a bit wary.  I do not want to “rain on any ones’ parade”, but I can not help but wonder about such a thing, as a very warm February.

Christian had a birthday one Friday. He detests fanfare and so I gave him a book-and we shared a special meal.  I told him the story again of the day he was born and he talked to me about his hopes and dreams.  To have a meaningful conversation, is a rarity these days.  . . but  oh, how beautiful. 

Christian has never been a big talker and the substance of his conversations  is never shallow.  He does not speak like a fool, that rattles along as if something is loose somewhere.  He speaks with thought. . .and after observation and  much consideration.  Such folks are few and far between these days. 

Brant, Sydney and their darling boys came home one weekend.  We  gathered at Mamas’ for a Sunday dinner.  

Mama had knee replacement  surgery on a Tuesday.  Sisters Connie, Delores and I are working in shifts for the next few weeks, cheering Mama along.  Mama dreaded the surgery, but she could hardly get around.  I am glad to report that she has made great strides in her recovery.

 I went to Raleigh  – in between shifts, so   what a lot of bustle for me!  Baby Banks is 4 months old .  For now, his heart belongs to his mama, though I got a fair amount of smiles. Ryan is three.  He is a small bundle of cheer and shine to me.   Usually, when I am visiting, Ryan is so excited to sleep with me.  Though he had said he was the first evening, I sensed a lack of enthusiasm.  Brant was encouraging him and mentioned that he could take care of me, should some need be.  About fifteen minutes after Ryan had snuggled in, he sat up and looked at me with a somber face and said “Honeybee, you are going to have to be brave”.  Then he slid out of the bed .  He looked back and  said “I am sorry, but I love him.” ( his daddy)  I laughed myself to sleep that night. 

The next morning Brant was up early for he leaves for work before dawn.  Sydney was up, for she had a class to attend.  I was up to have coffee before the boys got up several hours later . . . only, they didn’t- for Ryan woke up within a few minutes and little Banks was up, shortly after.  Sydneys’  mom joined me just a few hours later and between the two of us, all went well.  We had a sweet visit and enjoyed sharing such a special time with our grandsons. 

I declare again, that grandchildren are a wonderous gift-and not short of a miracle. 

I had a dreadful time when my own children grew and flew from my nest.  They would come home to visit and I would cry for three days when they left.  This lasted for years. Tending my nest, was the most important work I would ever do and since the nest was mostly empty, I couldn’t imagine the possession of fulfilment nor such gumption ever again.  None of my close friends, though they were sympathetic, had experienced this type of grief-for that is what it was.  I didn’t dare let on to my children about it, either.  I planted and cleaned and created with fervor and lied in wait of their return . . .for years.  Christian was unaware that he was my saving grace. 

When Lyla was born,  . . well, I had a renewed spirit and that changed everything.  Now, there are four little blessings that call me “Honeybee” and my gumption has returned in full force.   As I plant their birth flowers and fix up another old house, it is with them in mind, that I work.

I am always on a hunt for something beautiful because I want them to know all of the loveliness of life.  “I must tell them”, I think  when I listen to a magnificent piece of music, or read a tender poem-or smell a sweet blossom.

”  I must tell them. ”