I’m Late, I’m Late…. A Catch-Up Post

Do you ever have days where you've been working steadily all day and yet, when the day is done, you still can't tell that you've accomplished anything?  Yesterday was one of those days.  Although I know that I did accomplish things, and take time out for a couple of walks and to see the eclipse, I still feel like I was treading water.  Oh well, sometimes we struggle just to stay in place and other times we soar…..

Or perhaps I am just feeling that I am not living up to my intentions, not that I am a person who has ever had reasonable expectations for herself.  I've been home a week now, and today is the first day that I feel that I am completely back to normal, whatever normal is.  It is the first day I awoke at my normal time without an alarm, the first morning I focused easily rather than muddling about befogged.

Anyway, I missed Saturday's post,  because I was up late Friday, into Saturday morning really, starting to unpack the sewing room and move some heavy furniture around so that a friend could come over and the loom could finally be assembled. I had thought that I would be more organized than I was, that I would have transition time, but that didn't really happen until Friday.  It was late by the time that I realized that Saturday was the very next day.  It appears I can no longer keep up the pace of my youth, or perhaps it is simply that I no longer care to do so.

The photo is taken from the doorway into the room.  The heavy cabinets that form a work/cutting table were in the corner where the loom is now, but this arrangement works better.  In fact, this is almost how I originally had it drawn out on paper, at least in terms of the cutting table, but on moving day it somehow turned out differently.  I thought I could make it work, but I couldn't.  And there I was, instead of being reasonable and planning in advance, moving furniture around at 1 in the morning.  Obviously I still have to finish unpacking but now that the big weight, literal and figurative as well, has been taken care of, it all seems possible once again.

After the loom was assembled I realized I still had time to make it to the Market Square Farmer's Market.  I had missed the previous three weeks due to travel plans and I really needed to go.  I figured the vendors would be packing up, and they were, but there were still options.  When George and I went to the Rhinebeck market every week, we would walk around, I would think about what I might cook, then we would take a second trip around buying what we wanted.  I would go home, plan a list, and we would hit the grocery store for any ancillary supplies.   It doesn't work out quite that way in my life now, for a plethora of reasons.  A big one is that I am cooking for one most of the time, although I am looking forward to entertaining more.  

Instead I tend to go to the market with a sort of matrix written out on paper.  It includes things I have and need or want to use, current ideas that are floating around in my head, and so forth, but none of it is really prescribed.  Once I get to the market things may change radically, or not at all, depending on what I see and what inspires me.  This particular trip my choices were a refinement of the rough plan on paper.  I don't actually know why the matrix above was so pork-centric, except perhaps I was hoping to stop at JEM farm, which has good pork, and probably also because last week's meals seemed to revolve around beef and chicken.  I'm better at balance in the grand scheme than in a narrow frame of reference.

Going in with a plan works because I am less likely to get carried away by wanting to make everything I see, and then being overwhelmed after I get home and the week becomes busy.  I can plan to cook, but I can also intentionally leave gaps for those days or times when I just want something simple, nourishing, and relatively effortless.  I eat better, and am happier, when I cook, but cooking is much more fun when I am cooking for someone.  I'm still working on balance.

I did not try to take a picture of the eclipse.    I just sat out and enjoyed it.  I didn't travel either, but that was mostly because I needed to stay home for a delivery.  It was still wonderful.  And I am fortunate because I remember the 1979 eclipse.  This time I think I was more attuned to the minute changes in the fauna as we proceeded through the stages of the eclipse than I was at the tender age of 20, but that is probably because I simply am increasingly more attuned to those small details.  I listened to the birds and the insects and watched a pair of bobwhites come out from hiding on the edge of the lawn.  I love watching the birds in my new neighborhood, but Monday morning had been the first time I had see bobwhites. Just seeing them somehow makes me think of fall. 

I didn't see the bobwhites this morning on our walk. But the sunrise was beautiful. Tikka and I were out early and got to watch it from its first early glimmers. Have a lovely day.