A Good Monday

Today started as a 3 on the mood scale, but gradually I watched it movin' on up!

Maybe a dream, maybe a floating remnant of a memory, who knows why?--sometimes days just start off Low on my Personal Mood Chart.  So I decided to go back to sleep and start over for an hour or two, which had a salubrious effect on my mood.

One test of a good book for me is that it makes me want to stay wide awake and write.  Today, I  read a chapter of Strout's novel, said "Wow!" and started writing.  I read/wrote/read/wrote all day--until it was time to get ready for my writing group.  Charlotte's Birthday-Ending-With-a-Zero is happening this month and I wanted to get a particular dessert from Central Market--which they didn't have--so I made a banana pudding.

Then Charlotte brought yummy spreads, cookies and brownies from Bird Bakery--so we had all the makings of what Clarice calls a GALENTINE DAY party--a Valentine's Party for Gal-Friends.

I love my two writing groups!  Seven talented women in each, it's always energizing and illuminating to hear what everyone has written!

We did an exercise I borrowed from Andre Dubus III--saw it on Vemeo: We all wrote a list of smells associated with a certain person.  (I chose Miss Marguerite, mine and Betty's piano teacher). Then we wrote about that person's gestures, then we wrote about how we remember them in certain lights.  The writing that came out of that series of exercises was extraordinary poetry about people we've known who've impacted us.

At noon, the mailman brought me a package from Day that made me so happy.  She had made two inserts for the Chic Sparrow notebook, like the ones she made for herself.  One was a booklet made of watercolor paper; the other was a fabric insert with a pocket on one side and a zipper compartment on the other--both beautifully decorated as Day does all things.

There was also a white stuffed kitty in the box; only she and my mama would know why that particular present brought tears to my eyes!

I'd slept with a kitty very much like this one throughout high school and earlier.

On the day of my wedding, I had to decide: do you take a stuffed animal on your honeymoon?  Or do you leave childish things behind?  I chose to leave it--meaningfully--behind, to place it on my bed as a symbol for anyone who might want to know that  I was, henceforth, a bonafide adult.

But here we are, Day and me, playing with notebooks and watercolors and paint pens!  It took me a long time to learn that we should never leave childish things behind.