Another view of our wintry neighborhood woods. It's warm out today, about 60F at 9:30 in the morning. There's rain in the forecast, and thunderstorms, but at least it's mild and springlike. The gray does begin to get to me some days, although at the same time I like the Southern winter in its softness and dullness. It's a landscape that invites you to look closely for things coming up --- every day I see more daffodil spears, and they make me happy through all the midwinter torpor.
Here's another view across the ravine:
The road in the first picture goes around this strip of woods and creek in a loop. There are more woods at the foot of the loop, though also houses back in them and along the road. Yesterday afternoon Dora and I spent some time poking around in the grass by the creek, where skunk cabbage is up and growing, freshly green in the mostly-yellow grass. There are groundhog holes everywhere in the banks and the sides of the ravine, and Dora would like to dive down every one of them and drag its slumbering occupant into the daylight, to have the daylight beaten out of it. That's pretty much Dora's attitude toward the whole nonhuman world. People she likes, as long as they initially ignore her presence and let her decide when to approach them. But anything (else) in the Kingdom Animalia? Death. Death to it. Death and bloodshed and utter vanquishment. Says Dora the Shieldmaiden, every day.
Good thing I'm not totally uncute, says Dora the Shieldmaiden.
Here's a glimpse of what the day is like:
Our Lady of the Forsythia, January edition. I call this next one "Forsythia With Garage and Winter Trees":
It's gray and rainy, but look, Ma, no coat!
Making an idiot of myself taking selfies while we walked:
It's wonderfully misty, really my favorite kind of weather.
Here's what I'm actually wearing:
This is more or less exactly what I'd planned last night. I'm wearing my Wool& Fiona dress with my new-to-me Poshmarked pale-blue linen shirt tied over (I tucked the ends of the knot under because they were bugging me). Secondhand bamboo leggings from late 2021, Xero Colorado sandals, which are a good choice on a warmish, wet day.
As always, in taking pictures of yourself, angle is everything. This shot above is particularly flattering, I think. But for honesty's sake, here are some others that give you a little more of my body's reality.
A partial side shot, for example, shows you that I have a bit of a maternal/menopause tum. And I carry a good bit of my weight where I sit down. In other words, I may be many good things, but willowy isn't one of them.
Here again:
I actually like this photo and will probably lead with it on Instagram, because the composition is kind of striking. But you can see pretty clearly here that I don't have a flat stomach, like at all.
Which, mind you, is okay. It's my body. It serves me. I try to take care of it, moving it multiple miles daily and feeding it reasonable amounts of nutritious food. And here it is, 58 years old and still functioning, which really only strikes me as something to say because I read reports of the late Lisa Marie Presley's condition at the Golden Globes last week or the week before or whenever that was. She was basically unable to stand for long or to walk without holding onto someone's arm. And she was 54. Younger than I am. Granted, I don't know what she'd been putting into her 54-year-old body, or for how long, or anything like that. I have pretty vivid memories of her father's death from "heart failure" at 42 or 43, however old he was --- being from Memphis, I know exactly where I was that day, etc., in the same way that people ten years older than I am remember exactly where they were when Kennedy was shot. Anyway, whatever was up with Lisa Marie just before she died, it wasn't good. She needed assistance in ways that my 86-year-old mother and my 92-year-old mother-in-law don't, even now, and that's beyond sad. Anyway, all of that makes me grateful anew that at 58, which believe me does not feel old . . . well, that at 58 I don't feel remotely old. I just feel like me.
And whether I feel like it or not, this me has a lot to do today. My husband is out of town, so I'm going to do some more puttering and cleaning, some writing and editing, some ordering of groceries so that I have something I can feed myself tonight and tomorrow without too much effort. I'm going to pick something fun to watch tonight and watch it. I'm going to read and walk some more with Dora. I'm going to say my prayers and get good sleep. It'll be quiet around here, but we'll have ourselves a nice little time.
LATER:
In addition to writing another little intro essay, I have done some more work in the upstairs hall. Chiefly I've moved the dollhouses and other toy items into closets. Here's a shot down the length of the hall earlier today:
I'd really like to make some kind of nice little sitting area there where the hall widens out at the two bedrooms (I'm standing in the doorway of the office, formerly our oldest daughter's bedroom, to take this shot). But some situations still persist:
I've got to get some shelves. But I did clean out the dormer alcove at the end and, as I had hoped, moved some plants onto the windowseat, where they'll get sun. I also put up another set of curtains:
The plants will still get plenty of light. This would actually be a great place to start seeds. My fifteenth year in this house, and that's only just now occurring to me. Anyway. This area looks so much better. The hall looks so much less like an attic.
We're anticipating some houseguests in February --- one round, possibly two. Having things be presentable is kind of a dream of mine.
I also washed all the cafe curtains downstairs, which are identical to these. They're nothing special: cheap Walmart tier curtains that I happen to like because they're white, simple, and a little delicate. They're also easy to wash and rehang without drying --- they dry really fast. I still have windows without curtains, because I've been gradually working my way around and am down to windows that I don't know that I want to cover. I always leave the upper part uncurtained, because the divided lights are pretty and very much a part of this house's character, but people do like to look outside when they're sitting down, apparently. I on the other hand like a modicum of privacy, as long as my privacy measures still let in plenty of light. When we bought the house, all the windows had either old plastic miniblinds on them, or else were swathed in layers of curtain material, moire over chiffon, that kind of thing. I like my simple delicate little white semi-sheer cafe curtains. It would be better if I could make my own --- I know it's not hard --- but I can't cut or do anything else in a straight line, so . . . cheapo little curtains it is, and I am happy with them.
Also, I got some sushi and had it with kombucha for a late lunch. I realized I was starving, and that what I was hungry for was that. I have a roast-beef sandwich for dinner, and some more non-alcoholic beer, to treat myself this evening in my solitude. I plan to ENJOY it all.