Forgetting the weeds

Okay. There are weeds in the yard taller than me. There are several stacks of books on the floor in my study that would be a lot more comfortable on a shelf. We can't find the bill from the plumber who installed our new kitchen faucet.  And I don't even want to talk about upstairs. So there's plenty to do, but there is something about this blank space that is calling..

September seems to be a season of gratitudes. As  summer winds down and we head into a long cold spell, with not too much light, every sunny day seems like a gift.

So here are some things that I am grateful for today:

1. Gorgeous cherry tomatoes from Laura Krouse's Abbe Hills Farm.

I'm going to save a few for a salad tonight and roast the others in the oven with garlic and olive oil and save them for those cold days.

2. That my brother-in-law Ron is home and doing well.
3. That my granddaughter Evelyn gets to take her medicine with chocolate frosting. And that Owen has so far avoided the need for medicine this fall.

Owen and Evelyn in June

4. That Alice Waters and the Trip to Delicious turned out to be such a beautiful book (thanks Hayelin Choi for those lovely illustrations and Philip Lee of Readers to Eaters for all your care with the book!) and I get to go to California next week for a book party at the Edible Schoolyard in Berkeley. It's Wednesday, September 17 from 2:00 to 4:00 p.m. I'll also be visiting with the students at the LeConte School on Thursday. We'll be talking about the fun of stories and good food and writing about lives. On Thursday afternoon Philip and June Lee, Anne Ylvisiker and I will be at the Berkeley Farmers Market on Shattuck Avenue. On Saturday we get to go to Book Passage in SanFrancisco.  Finally Saturday afternoon at 4:00 I'll be reading the book at the Claremont Branch of the Berkeley Public Library.  I hope whoever is in the Bay Area and reads this will be able to come to one--or more--of these events.

5. That my granddaughter Ella is enrolled in a wonderful Spanish language immersion school in Chicago. And that Jonah hardly ever falls off his scooter.

 

Jonah and Ella

6. That Rich and I saw a Belted Kingfisher this morning.

7. There's more--family in Maine, who are eating succotash they grew themselves, playing with dogs, reading Middlemarch; writing friends here in Iowa and all over the country who keep me going when I'm not sure about where I'm going. You know who you are.

8. Finally, I guess it's enough that the sun came up once more, and we get to try again to be present in the world, rough and roiling and beautiful as it is.