A splurge from the other day: dollar pots of muscari/grape hyacinth to put in the wicker plant stand by the front door. With twinkly white Christmas lights interspersed among them -- because once I get out Christmas lights, the Christmas lights stay out -- they make a pretty show day and night. Once the muscari are done blooming, I'll plant them in the garden -- can't have too many spring bulbs, say I -- and find something else to put in the plant stand. I keep meaning to paint it, as I've painted other outdoor items acquired from my mother, but I haven't done it yet. I think some kind of aqua blue would be pretty, but then I'd probably need to repaint other porch furniture as well, since I have mostly a primary-color scheme going on. The porch table, which is red, is starting to look as though it needs repainting anyway, so maybe I'll do it in an aqua, too, which would still look nice with the cobalt-blue and yellow chairs. Or maybe I'll just do nothing about any of it for another year. Overall, that seems the more probable course of action.
Still writing my Lenten sonnets: a Spenserian one today, which I don't think I've ever done. One of the sonnets from Spenser's Amoretti is Monday's poem at the Sun, for which I wrote a little brief disquisition on the development of the sonnet in English and noted Spenser's particular form, with its ababbcbccdcdee rhyme scheme. I don't think I'd ever written a Spenserian sonnet before, though I have certainly played with different schemes in the sonnet -- now I'm contemplating writing it backwards next time, as in literally the same poem in reverse, if I can get it to work without changing anything. Of course, then I'd have the same last line as I'd had two sonnets previously, since I'm also writing a crown -- but that might not be bad. It might set up a kind of rumination, which this phase of the whole project is doing anyway, having moved from the reality (or not) of angels to events in the Lord's years of ministry to the ways that the earth itself echoes not only patterns of death and resurrection, but also betrayal (a meditation on the redbud tree, also known as the Judas Tree, which I'm not sure entirely works, but whatever, for now). I guess the whole thing is really probing the reality of God, in probing the reality of things He has created, which can have no reality without His bending His attention upon them.
The college kids leave tomorrow -- the week has flown. We haven't done much, but then I'm not sure they wanted to do that much, just hang out in their own rooms and decompress. They've been out some with friends, and the barista has secured her summer job in the coffee shop, but that's about it. One child has been pursuing a diagnosis for ADHD/learning issues, which I wish very much we had addressed earlier, but we are doing what we can to support and help with that process now. I am girding myself to do a lot of daily texting to ask things like, "What have you done today to help yourself with the things you're struggling with." Said child is taking a couple of classes which are particularly uncongenial this semester and having a hard time; those experiences tend to dominate all the good experiences you have, in my own experience, and digging yourself out of the hole you put yourself in -- deeper than it has to be, because you project its darkness onto absolutely everything -- is tough. Anyway, I feel anxious about it all, not because I necessarily care what grades this child makes (Cs and Ds get degrees, man, as I am in some position to know), but because self-image is bound up, inevitably to some degree, with performance. When everybody around you can breeze through stuff, and you're collapsing under the weight of it, how does that make you feel about your own ability even to dream of being competent?
Anyway, we're working on that: life hacks now, appointments as we can get them. Wishing we'd done it years ago, and beating myself up a bit about that, but better now than never.
Wearing today:
My trusty wool Sierra, with purple Oswego shoes. It's pretty warm this afternoon, and in fact I'm testing just how warm is too warm for this dress, which tends to feel very sweaterlike. Seems fine for today, when it's 68 right now, and set to be over 70F before starting to cool down again for the night.
Going out in a minute to transplant some herbs, I think. It is a day for being outside, at least while it's not raining. Apparently there's going to be some variability: sun and rain, all in turn. Better grab the day while I can do it without getting soaked.