WE POSITION OUR TABLE AND CHAIRS

 23 of #100daychallenge

Wow. I am glad I haven't yet taken my bedtime meds as I can scarcely keep my head off of the keyboard. 

Although I did take, well, not really a nap, but some floaty-dreamy lie-down time. I might have made it to doze phase but did not get up feeling that much refreshed. Once I got going this morning, I moved back and forth between furniture painting, staining, and waxing, and gardening. Gardening was largely composed of pulling weeds, trimming bougainvillea, and getting a few things into the ground. My neighbor, Gus, out on his evening perambulation, thanked me for my neighborhood service of planting so many flowers. No one else has a garden that looks anything like mine.

Cherry blossoms coming out a bit. I nearly killed this tree, so pleased to see this.

Here's a pomegranate blossom from the backyard. Hope I get some fruit this year.

Matilija poppies in the backyard. They are obscured by overgrown and dying tomatoes.

This was just weeds two months ago. Prettier than this really.

A gardener's work is never done. Often, usually even, I enjoy it, but right now I just feel stressed about it. There is so much to do in the garden and I need to keep making progress in the house. I did pull up some weeds in the back so that my arugula can flourish without fighting.

THE NIAGARA RIVER

As though

the river were

a floor, we position

our table and chairs

upon it, eat, and 

have conversation.

As it moves along,

we notice—as

calmly as though

dining room paintings

were being replaced—

the changing scenes

along the shore. We

do know, we do 

know this is the

Niagara River, but

it is hard to remember

what that means.

— Kay Ryan, The Best of It: New and Selected Poems, Grove Press, New York, 2010