October 11, 2021 [from 10.21.08]

Schedule wraps itself around a life and takes the reins. Trying to step outside is hard. So be happy with small victories and patient with blank walls. The lessons are important, and at this point more real than the results.

October 10, 2021 [from 10.22.08]

Grey clouds blanket the sky like a dirty comforter blotting out the sun. Birds perch on a phone wire, waiting.

October 9, 2021 [from 10.23.08]

We carry hope with us, our own and others’, realistic or not. Hopes are more fragile than expectations, more solid than dreams. They often lie beyond concrete achievement, and so rely on happenstance or definition to become true.

October 8, 2021 [from 10.24.08]

Last night was first frost. And so this morning finds me on my knees in the white-fringed grass taking pictures of guilded leaves and sugar-coated flowers. A temporary prelude to winter, already evaporating in the sun.

October 7, 2021 [from 10.25.08]

A new generation is beginning, and I watch in quiet awe, remembering. I want to be present for this transition, not just rush past the process to the gleeful purchase of baby clothes. I didn’t know when I decided to write a journal that this would be the year my daughter became a mother. But in a few months our family will gain a new member, and we will all add new titles– mother, father, uncle, grandmother, great-grandmother– and have a new way to belong to each other. The generations move over a notch. This time I’m only an observer, and so I bear witness, with joy.

week 676 [from week 2] I swallow my heart like a goldfish

I swallow my heart like a goldfish and
hope it remembers how to swim back to
its old spot in my chest what did I do
to end up holding disappointment’s hand
again I say it doesn’t matter it
really does though I close my eyes but my
mind pops open and as hard as I try
I can’t collide with sleep so we just sit
my dreams and I on the edge of the bed
and wait it out like drunkards or cowboys
or someone with plans until light destroys
our refuge and day drags us out instead
of hope grant me a lifetime warranty
so I can schedule my recovery

October 6, 2021 [from 10.26.08]

Today my children are waking up in their old rooms. It doesn’t happen often, as their lives now center in different far-off places. But I remember fondly, as my daughter moves toward motherhood, when this house was home for us all. Past nurture, past all need, there remains a bond here that I cherish, respect, and try always to deserve.

October 5 [from 10.27.21]

It’s so easy to plug my kids back into my life (except the waiting for the bathroom part). But today they left and it feels like there’s a 3-prong hole in my heart.

October 4, 2021 [from 10.28.08]

Stormy day, windy, pouring rain on and off. But I get to unwrap a symphony for students who didn’t know they were interested. And the sun breaks through for a few minutes in the afternoon.

October 3, 2021 [from 10.29.08]

The envelope of a cloudy day holds transformation. It subjects sky and landscape to the alchemy of light and dark, creating a lens for mystery.