It has been a busy week, well not quite a week, but who is counting? And we have all been busy, busy with the stuff of life, whatever that stuff may be. It is not my place to either hold up my life, nor to judge the choices and/or circumstances of others. I continue to struggle with blogging, with subject matter, and privilege, with the idea that we way we present ourselves to the world is a gloss, an edited version of ourselves, even more so on the web than in our day to day lives.
But I spend too much time thinking. And perhaps I spend too much time writing about merely one side of life. Maybe I need to write about the more quotidian things, about the basic boring aspects of life that we all have to deal with, boring as they may be to write about. I suspect however that no one wants me to post a picture of a vacuum, of a bucket of water and a mop. Perhaps we read to escape the mundane. I too. But why do we think the necessary and the quotidian is less worthy than the exceptional?
So here is a day, yesterday, in fact. But even that, of course is edited. What is shown? What is not? What is worthy of mention? What is not?
I usually wake up somewhere between 6 and 7. There have been periods of my life where it was earlier, and times when I have slept later. I make the bed. I make coffee. If Moises has been out overnight, I let him in. I sit and write out whatever random thoughts arise. Yesterday I also read a letter that arrived a month ago, when I was in hospital, and which I had misplaced. It was, then, a special kind of treat. I found the letter on Thursday, and colored in the card stock, an act of active doodling, before reading the actual letter.
Next I usually meditate, dress, and eat breakfast. Yesterday that meant scrambled eggs with broccoli raab and fresh tomatoes from the garden.
As I walked back from the vegetable garden to the house, I admired the Coreopsis.
Then it was time for daily household maintenance. Yesterday that meant dusting and vacuuming. It also meant that I finally started on a thorough cleaning of the stove and stove vent. Started, but did not finish, alas. Completion of that task should be accomplished today, and since it is raining, there are fewer distractions. I also managed to ignore the crystal on the dining table. A cabinet had to be emptied so that a faulty lighting circuit could be repaired. I fully intend to wash all of the glassware before returning it to the cabinet. But not yet.
I had to run to Walgreens to pick up medications and a few other items. By the time I returned home my stomach was rumbling and my blood sugar was low. While I warmed some soup, I quickly made mayonnaise.
My reward was a lunch of tuna salad rolled up in sesame leaves and spicy eggplant soup, a soup made from my own tomatoes and eggplant.
After lunch, and zooming with friends, I went back outside because I thought I had noticed an azalea blooming. I moved this azalea, Marshy Creek Humdinger, in early June as it seemed to be growing smaller and more frail in its previous location. This is the first time I recall seeing it bloom.
A nap, my stretching routine, and a late afternoon walk helped me finish out the day. I read until it was time for dinner, when I reheated some chile verde and sliced a couple more small tomatoes. After cleaning up I watched and listened to The Bad Plus streaming from the Bijou Theater and knitted.
All in all, it was a good day. It was a pretty typical day. Increasingly I think a good day is just this, what we do, what we need to do, to nourish and sustain ourselves, body and spirit.
