A Half-Baked Post

Photo courtesy of Brenda Parent, Access to the Garden

It's hot, humid and sticky outside. Breathing would be easier with gills.

Other people enjoy cavorting at the beach or gardening. I am not one of those people. Gardens hate me, anyway. I have accidental herbicidal maniac tendencies, and plants can sense it.

Summertime leaves me longing for the top of Mt. Everest, though far too lazy to reach it. My version is spending forty-five minutes on an inclined treadmill at the nice, chilly gym. Sir Edmund Hillary would not be impressed. It would be much easier with a sherpa bearing lemonade and dabbing my sweaty brow.

Even with the best of intentions, my forays into the blazing sunshine leave me drained and grumpy. My regularly scheduled cheerfulness should return in the cool of Alabama's October.

When we lived in Florida, I dressed in sweaters—my form of seasonal denial—as soon as the calendar suggested it might be appropriate. This resulted in an even more venomous attitude than usual, though I got good cardio in by running from air conditioner to air conditioner. I used to say I felt like a hydrangea moved too far south, wilted and occasionally trampled by yankee tourists. That's why the wonderful "Sunflower with Moon" photo in this blog inspired me with its perfect illustration of my June/July/August experience.

It's hard on the chickens, too. They loll about under bushes or array themselves on the ground, wings spread and looking scarily lifeless all day. Sometimes I sneak them ice cream sandwiches.

Where's the Good Humor lady?

Wherever you are, I hope it's cool and comfortable . . . unless you're one of those unfathomable people who enjoy that special sauna feeling. In that case, I hope you're burning up.

Love from Delta.

My Mother Got Mad At Me . . .

     . . . because she gave me a beautiful painting of hers, and I hung it in my bathroom. Mom is a brilliant watercolorist. I am not, though we took classes together for years. A wonderfully talented man named Jerry McClish taught us; his motto, he would chuckle, was "slop and hope."

     I slopped with much less hope than my mother.

     Today was punctuated by disappointments, some small and others medium. The website that's supposed to feature me as "Author of the Week" is having technical difficulties, and I suspect my week will be over before they're resolved. My beloved hairstylist called to announce she's moving to another town, and I'm not sure I want to drive nearly an hour to get my tresses tamed. My tiny landlord business is frustrating me in too many ways to describe.

     I wrote several paragraphs for my new book, and I find them eminently boring. The theoretical paper in my theoretical typewriter in the laptop will have to be theoretically crumpled and discarded.

     I didn't make it to the gym. Again.

     My guest cat's litterbox needs cleaning, the laundry's piling up, and I probably should have mopped or vacuumed something. Dust bunnies are breeding like the name implies.

     So, I decided a nice bath would be soothing. I laid in the tub, contemplating the ten pounds I didn't address through exercise or any responsible dietary means. I looked up and saw Mom's lighthouse, sitting serene on a peaceful beach, and couldn't help smiling. There's a reason it hangs in the bathroom, Mother . . . at the end of a trying day, it reminds me we each possess talents of our own and that—Scarlett, you're right—tomorrow is another day.



Love from Delta.