Monday Night

I should go to bed.  It's almost midnight. 

But there is so much to do still!  It's been one of those happy place days.

Charlotte and Kate and I had a little potluck brunch at Janet's to have one more chance to be together before Janet gets the call that her first grand baby is here, to welcome her into the club of grandmothers.  I would post a picture, but my blog is still not posting pictures for some reason.  

Day will fix it when she gets time.

I've been struggling with a tech problem for weeks--not knowing how to put printed words in a handmade book.  I emailed the heads of the Handmade Book Club and they didn't know how either.  Just when I was about to give up, Day called and made me a template on Google Docs (don't know what that is) and sent me instructions and templates in five minutes!

My brilliant daughter can fix anything!  

She's going back to teaching this year, so excited to be back with students after being an academic coach.  Soaking up every minute of making things before school starts, she's made a model of her glass shack, an actual architectural model!  I couldn't do that for any price.  

She's also into painting shoes and adding embroidery to an old chair. Here I really wish I could send you pictures--two pair of tennis shoes transformed into delightful colorful shoes!

So I went to the quilt shop and got some Pellon to make some more book cloth, then came home and made some book covers out of a plaid skirt I'd bought at Boysville.  I'll send you a picture when Day fixes the bug in my blog.

Then we joined Jan and Carma for our nightly walk.  I'm over-the-moon grateful that I can walk without pain.  It's changed my life!

So closing in on sleep, of course, I watched reel after reel of Dachshund and Corgi videos--while my actual Dachshund-Corgi-whatever burrowed under the covers.  I added a new reel category, one called The Asher House, a series of films about a man who adopts hopeless dogs and turns them into healthy animals again, the kind of stories you cannot possibly watch without tears. 

When Luci saw me get up to write this, she asked if she could go outside. 

"Sweet Darkness"--a poem by David Whyte--came to mind.  How this girl loves going outside in the dark, fearless and brave, being a wild thing!   The night is her time to run and pounce and growl at imagined trespassers.  The night is her time to return to her roots, to do the things of her unknown ancestors, not governed by rules or domestication, out of sight of all humans.

When she comes back in, hoping with all her heart for a slice of turkey, I can tell she wants to tell me what she met out there. 

Nothing can lighten the load of the world's unspeakably grim news than the company of a little dog who lives entirely in the moment.  To watch an animal being its pure self, never holding a grudge against its people, or to watch a good man love one back to life no matter how long it takes--these are  reminders of the goodness we have to do everything in our power to be sure comes out on top.