I am not at home. As I type this, I can't read the title of this post and the body is in a text size view of 1 inch. My mom's computer does these contortions, and I haven't even asked why. Isn't that what it's like to visit moms? We go about our daily work, but suddenly a lens is cast over us -- by ourselves, by the habits of old family -- that distort even our daily rhythms. I'm actually more amused than anything. The experience has been a very gentle one so far this trip.
My sister, Robyn, the boys, and I have come to my mother's organic lavender farm (Harvest Moon Lavender) to help with the harvest. Robyn and I have been out cutting lavender (thank God for the Felcos being such a pleasure to hold) for hours each day, kids wandering, hunting lizards, riding the tractor trailer, and swimming.
I imagine my family thinks me a bit odd, avoiding sugar and artificial additives in the kids food on the whole and letting go to the holiday spirit completely as I am overcome by it. Yesterday, Robyn and I made a trip into town with the kids and stopped at a natural bakery/grocery. While Robyn picked out a wine for dinner, the boys used their money to get a GIANT chocolate cupcake with equally enormous frosting. By the time we left the store, Trinidad was barking.
We went to the Arcata Plaza where Trin and Sam broke out their new street hockey set from the dollar store and played hockey on concrete for an hour or so. They were sweating and running furiously. Auntie Robyn came along and became audience to the flight of rubber band launched jets ("Watch out for the bicyclist... oh, the bicyclist... Sorry!"), catapulting plastic flies, and (get this) an almost remote control cockroach. We decided not to take that one to my favorite Chinese restaurant.
So far, mother, two daughters, and grandkids have survived peaceably under one roof. Three and a half days without dispute has got to be a record. I am grateful for their hosting and the fact that over the years of my adulthood, we have learned more and more ways to weave our days together more effectively and beautifully. I am thrilled to have meaningful work to do here, cutting flowers. Meditative, too.
Poetry comes with no pen to write, given over as the clouds trace their truths across the open sky and release their empty words to the western wind. Such is the harvest.
My sister, Robyn, the boys, and I have come to my mother's organic lavender farm (Harvest Moon Lavender) to help with the harvest. Robyn and I have been out cutting lavender (thank God for the Felcos being such a pleasure to hold) for hours each day, kids wandering, hunting lizards, riding the tractor trailer, and swimming.
I imagine my family thinks me a bit odd, avoiding sugar and artificial additives in the kids food on the whole and letting go to the holiday spirit completely as I am overcome by it. Yesterday, Robyn and I made a trip into town with the kids and stopped at a natural bakery/grocery. While Robyn picked out a wine for dinner, the boys used their money to get a GIANT chocolate cupcake with equally enormous frosting. By the time we left the store, Trinidad was barking.
We went to the Arcata Plaza where Trin and Sam broke out their new street hockey set from the dollar store and played hockey on concrete for an hour or so. They were sweating and running furiously. Auntie Robyn came along and became audience to the flight of rubber band launched jets ("Watch out for the bicyclist... oh, the bicyclist... Sorry!"), catapulting plastic flies, and (get this) an almost remote control cockroach. We decided not to take that one to my favorite Chinese restaurant.
So far, mother, two daughters, and grandkids have survived peaceably under one roof. Three and a half days without dispute has got to be a record. I am grateful for their hosting and the fact that over the years of my adulthood, we have learned more and more ways to weave our days together more effectively and beautifully. I am thrilled to have meaningful work to do here, cutting flowers. Meditative, too.
Poetry comes with no pen to write, given over as the clouds trace their truths across the open sky and release their empty words to the western wind. Such is the harvest.
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