Who goes there? Please leave comments so (An Aries Knows)!
Photo: Sunlight and shadows on granite and tile samples.
I remember a time when Shannon photographed the inside of her refrigerator and made me jealous with all the goodies inside it. In comments to a recent post of Lisa’s, I issued a challenge. Without cleaning/organizing it, shoot your fridge and put it on your journal/blog.
My refrigerator, like my stove, is in the middle of my dining room while my kitchen is being remodeled.
No way would I go shopping today. But then, I don’t shop very often anyway, so I don’t think my absence will affect holiday sales too drastically.
As for yesterday, because of markgharris, codyfrizbeejr, samdewinter, and seahorsemystic, we had a full table and reason to be thankful.
Recently I saw a postcard on Post Secret that made me really sad. Someone had written that she wished she had enough friends to give her a wedding shower. My heart broke for her. I thought of all the times in my life that my girlfriends and I have celebrated happy occasions together–graduations, marriages, births, kids’ accomplishments, new jobs, promotions, even dumping the wrong guy–or sustained each other through the loss of friends, family members, animals, jobs–and being dumped by the one we thought was Mr. Right.
Nora, Vicki, Amy, and I all started work at roughly the same time for the same company in 1992. By 1996, two of us had been laid off, one of us resigned, and one of us continued working with a group that splintered off and formed their own company. We worked together only four years; we haven’t worked together for eleven, yet here we are, a couple of weeks ago, at the baby shower Vicki gave for Nora, who’s expecting not just her first child, but her first TWO children–twin daughters–in January. And Amy is expecting son number three in December.
I love these women. There were times that I honestly don’t think I could’ve kept going without them. We have laughed and cried and bitched together. We have watched one another make mistakes and falter. We have seen one another make good choices and persevere. We have had so many wonderful things to celebrate. I cherish all my friends, women and men, and can’t imagine how desolate my life would be without them.
So my heart really hurt for the woman who sent in the postcard. Then someone responded on the Post Secret site and said, “I’ll give you a shower.” And someone else responded and said, “I’ll come!” And suddenly all over the Internet, people were reaching out to her, wondering where she lived, promising to help make her wedding a celebration. I hope she saw all those responses. Even if she isn’t able to meet those strangers or allow them to show her kindness, I hope their reactions embolden her to reach out to women who are around her, to learn to be a friend to them and to be graced in turn by their friendship.
Tuesday night I had to go on a small adventure (details will be provided in some future LJ post). I’d already picked a destination, but after talking to Lindsey, I changed my mind.
I’ve mentioned the dandelion fountain on LJ before. Though I’ve admired it for many years and I always point it out to visitors, I’ve never actually stopped and seen the fountain up close and personal. Lindsey suggested it as the ideal spot for what I needed, so off I went. Tom and the girls went with me, because Tom’s always ready for adventure that doesn’t involve anyone losing a kidney.
Close up, I love the fountain even more. I think that being remembered with a fountain and a little park area would be a nice legacy*.
Margot and Guinness had a great time, and everyone arrived home with their kidneys intact.
*Edit: Of course, he also built a huge corporation and has a Houston performing arts center named for him, too.
…is the birthday of someone I adore, and I’m unable to get in touch with him which is MADDENING. I was fifteen the day he was born. Everyone was at the hospital but my father and me, and they made me go to my piano lesson, so I didn’t get there before he made his big entrance (and I DO mean big, at nine pounds and nine ounces).
In those days, no one knew the sex of a baby until it was actually delivered. We spent almost nine months calling it “Goose,” but once he arrived and got his real name, I never called him anything but Daniel because I thought the name was as beautiful and perfect as he was.
Many years later, when a certain tandem story came my way and I had to name its narrator, I chose the name of this absolutely wonderful child who–even though he usurped my position as family baby when he became the first grandchild of my parents–is someone I will love unconditionally until I take my last breath on this planet–and beyond.
Happy birthday, Daniel. Your kids are now older than you were when this photo was taken! Which is so weird, because I’m only thirty-five.
Thank you.
Mark G. Harris wanted to know about “those pantelets.”
She was a birthday gift from women I used to work with. He was a Christmas gift from Tom.
Look for it only in books, for it is no more than a dream remembered.
Just wanted to reassure those of you who are checking on me that I’m fine. Just busy. In addition to working on the novel, I’m doing some contract work for one of my most favorite clients, who I haven’t worked with in six years, so I’m delighted.
Tom and I are simultaneously finalizing plans for the renovations at The Compound that we’ve been preparing for since sometime in June. That’s all going to be exciting, if disruptive. And this is the week Nature decided it was time for me to have my first four-day migraine headache in several months. Thank goodness Tim’s out of the hospital, not only for his own sanity, but because of those moments when he drops his hands on my shoulders to work out a few knots. He’s very good at that.
And thank goodness for my other old friend, Vicodin.
I like this photo I took the other day of the way the sun cast a shadow of my glasses across my manuscript.
I’d show you the larger version, but it wouldn’t be nice to make you read a page of something that won’t be available for at least a year, right?