summer vacation?
Usually I write in the morning. I am fresh and it’s easier to watch the thoughts spool out over a page. Except lately that has not been the case. Mornings here have been beautiful, perfect, foggy, all the birds, the damp verdant smell of summer in a temperate rain forest.
I have been watching sparrows. Noticing the cherries swelling on the tree. Lying and facing the fir trees watching the needles begin to dry out, the sap round and fresh on the deck, ants industriously moving this same sap around.
But I have not been writing, or at least not on the computer. And mostly the writing is lists. It is lists of the tasks left to finish the massive refresh of the house my family and I will move to. Lists of what I already forgot to do here for moving. Lists of the things that I need to remember for gymnastics camp or something. It is the kind of writing that takes over life and does its best to drown out the poetry. The kind of thinking, I mean writing, that is like sorting beans from rice. Minute. Exact. Requiring the correct sight. Tedious and for some periods necessary.
So I wanted to let you know that I’ll be doing the things on those lists for the next set of weeks, likely until mid-August. I’ll be moving. Finishing up a house. Hopefully sneaking in a dip in the Puget Sound when I can. Maybe if I am lucky eating some island strawberries. For those of you who are paid subscribers, send me an email and I’ll pause your payment until I am back. Otherwise, I’ll see you then. Catch some sun for me! I hope your summer is broad, expansive, and delicious.
Sending you all the island strawberries, quick swims and summer music as you move in and settle into your new home! 🤍🤍
Summer saludos to you, too , and good luck with the lists! I know that feeling and agree about lists! I bet some of the lists, punctuated the right way, would make poems! :)