Everything in it's place

We have ants in the house.  Nearly everyone we talk to, has ants in their house.  They are slowly diminishing but not fast enough and yesterday I bought some organic spray for the kitchen.  The ant itself is a fascinating little, if not abhorrent creature.  They are a social species and some colonies number in the millions.  The millions! But just when I think I stand these "useless" insects any longer, I see a reminder that each of us has a reason for being left to our own purpose.

Yesterday, after being bit by the yard sale bug I found myself in a consignment shop.  I was certain I would find nothing to compare to my great scores of the day: a big old box fan in eggshell blue purchased from a lovely old man with a gold stud in one ear, a funky piece of fabric from a young girl helping her grandmother clear out some items, and some giveaways from a neighbor friend of my sister's.  But I was wrong.  I found a rocking chair with such great bones, I figured it would be uncomfortable and sat in it.  I figured wrong and was claimed.

I was never a huge fan of rocking chairs until yesterday.  I will try them out occasionally, but I'm not long impressed.  I did find a really great chippy pair at a friend's shop not too long ago and was sorely tempted.  I don't much regret the miss - it simply wasn't mean to be.  But this chair was different.  My first walk-away from it had me feeling I'd forgotten something important.  The second look revealed lifting laminate and that would have been the death knell except I sat in it.  The arms of the chair had been held, the rockers had been rocked and I was sold at first creak.  I've never sat in so comfortable a rocking chair.  I felt a lightness as I listened to every dry creak and knew it was mine as I imagined all the imagining one could do in a chair such as this.

What will happen when there is nothing left to see

The light plays through the closed bamboo blinds, blocking the heat.  I watch the patterns shift on the wall above the bed.  The sun as it slides into it's evening pocket has been brutal today, but the light play on the wall has enchanted me and I forgive.  The slide of day into dusk through the changing pattern is poetry.  I am alive to see this.  I am conscious that it even it exists.  And miles away killing oil is pumping into the ocean.  The greed machine grinds away.

They grow so fast

My youngest wants to sleep on the couch. My husband, wants to write without the threat of interruption. I call to my boy who flat-foots it forlornly into my bedroom and flops down on the bed. I too, wish to write, but the sight of him - fading hints of baby chub, broadening shoulders, developing biceps, makes my heart ache for toddler he no longer is. He understands. He is creative himself and hates to be interrupted mid-creation, but it stings him to be told it's bedtime. I hold him close to me for a hug. He breathes deeply and tells me he loves the smell of my hair. "Just a few minutes Mom, so I can relax, please?" I acquiesce. Someday I will be old and he will be off on his own life, and I will think, "please son? So I can relax?"

Spring brings the change

I've got an empty glass and my corkscrew poised. I shut off the cooling pad for my laptop and sit back relaxed into birdsong. For a few minutes at least I have the peace I long for. I cannot explain the joy I have at hearing the birds in the canopy that surrounds our newest place. Or, that later, when the city begins to sleep, I will have full access to the crickets that at the old place eluded me until (like clockwork) August 1st every summer.

In the last few weeks I've begun to feel a renewed sense of creativity. This move was the best thing we could have done, and while it hasn't been perfect, I think I rather prefer it that way. I've poured my wine, someone has turned the t.v. on and boys begin to argue over the mundane. After a brief moment when my shoulders begin to hunch I realize, I am here and now and things have begun to change.