There's no law that says you can't grow lettuce and garlic in the same container. You can just do things.
Overcast this morning, so today's high of 64F might feel a tad chillier than it actually is. The forecast is for showers, which is good news for our drought conditions and for my plants, but not great news for walking to the coffee shop to meet a friend --- although yes, I'm walking, I don't care what the weather's doing (unless it's truly bucketing down, in which I case I will reassess).
Today's agenda:
*Take the dog out for a spin, feed and re-crate her while I go out
*meet friend for coffee on courthouse square
*write at least one essay for next week
*consider what might be for supper tonight
*concoct said supper
And so on. In other words, a nice day in that I have the diversion of coffee out, but otherwise very same-old-same-old. Which is fine, of course, but at the tail end of Lent I do begin to feel not so much deprived as bored with everything. Pushing through the boredom then becomes the big challenge --- and that's important. We all want to be heroes as well as saints, but the real sanctification lies in perseverance. For some of us, pain would be easier to persevere through (well, okay, not me, maybe, because I am a baby about pain) than boredom and that sense of the mundane that can so easily flatten out into malaise. Yet the call is always to keep going, through whatever pushback life and our own brains are dealing out to us.
But Lent is almost over. And next week, thankfully, will be busy: choir practice Monday night, Chrism Mass Tuesday, another choir practice for Easter morning on Wednesday night --- then the Triduum. We'll go to the Abbey for most of it, but then I've just committed to sing with the choir at St. Michael, in Gastonia, for Easter morning, so it'll be the whole big deal.
Meanwhile, I'm happy so far with progress on the libretto. Yesterday I wrote a draft of the entire first act, and while I don't know yet what my collaborator thinks about it, I think I'm pretty satisfied at least with the arc of the drama, which seems workable. I'm following the narrative of David's kingship from 2 Samuel, though delving back into scenes from 1 Samuel, and the opening of that book, when the Amalekite comes with news of the death of Saul (whom he says he's killed, at Saul's own request) takes you right off to the races with David as a character --- already issuing orders (to have the man executed) as though he were a king, when he's not, yet.
The act ends in an exchange between Bathsheba, betrothed but not yet married, and a maidservant who has brought her news that David is coming to be crowned in Jerusalem. Bathsheba as well as David has to be a character from the beginning---I've drawn a good deal from Euripides' Andromache, in The Trojan Women, in imagining her as a tragic figure who rather than being a passive victim, participates in her own fall as much as David does. The trick will be to demonstrate both characters' essential virtue, and to make their mutual choice for adultery plausible.
This is all important because a) difficult as it is, you can hardly tell David's story without referencing Bathsheba, and b) in telling that story, the lazy way out would be to make either her a seductress or him a rapist, and either way, those are reductive categories to which tragic heroes and heroines can't belong, and still be both tragic and heroic. It's his story, but it's also their story, as part of the large story of salvation (not achieved by the end of the opera --- in fact, the drama ends on David's death with the temple yet unbuilt, and Solomon as a new character setting his face for the future).
Anyway, that's the libretto. I worked longer on it yesterday than I generally do work on imaginative writing in a day, and I was wrung out by late afternoon, when I'd finished that act. But it felt very good to do.
Wearing today:
*Wool& Sierra dress (XS) in Iris Blue, bought January 2025, last worn April 5. Wears in 2025: 17. Dang. Still winning the race, Iris Blue Sierra. Driving down that cost-per-wear, though I'm not bothering right now to calculate what that cost-per-wear precisely is.
*Thrifted Chico's linen button shirt, second year of wear
*Secondhand Devala cotton-bamboo leggings, fourth year of wear
*Secondhand Birkenstock Mayaris, second year of wear
Sierra: always a good default on a day of iffy weather. Right now I'm actually a bit chilly in this linen shirt, but I'll add a jacket to go out. I forget how many times I've worn this exact outfit in Lent, but it's been a repeater for its comfort and the way the colors go together. I thought about adding a green pullover, but in my mind's eye the greens jarred, so I didn't. The green of these leggings --- redyed by me in 2023, after my having bought them in the fall of 2021 --- reads as pretty neutral, which has been my idea all along. There are actually lots of colors in my wardrobe that go well with this dark periwinkle, but my Lenten rule has been purple + neutral, or neutral + purple, so I'm sticking to that. I don't think I've even worn my green maxi skirt --- maybe once, actually, early on, over this dress so that I could go to church, but that's been it.
And that's been a great thing. I'd like to meditate on this rule further, but I have already meditated on it a lot, and it's time to take the dog out before I walk up to the coffee shop.
EVENING UPDATE
A nice morning out for coffee, a reasonably productive afternoon of essay-writing, plus some revisions to the libretto act I wrote yesterday. Hard rain in the late afternoon. Middle-Eastern red-lentil soup for dinner. It's still wet and thundering now, so I don't know how much walking we will do --- fortunately Dora has on her Thundershirt, which really does miraculously calm her down.
Still contemplating --- a little leftover contemplation from this morning --- how nice it's been to keep my Lenten wardrobe capsule fairly simple and focused. I mean: not that it's not been plenty of things to wear. I own four purple dresses in various shades, including my purple silk dress. I own three basically gray dresses (I really think Washed Navy is more gray than blue), one navy, and one brown (which I've worn only once this Lent). When I look at it this way, it seems like a lot for a capsule, especially when you consider that at the start of Lent, I didn't limit myself only to neutral accessories. So . . . this has not been that hard, although pink, green, and teal are looking REALLY APPEALING to me by now.
Maybe next year I'll JUST wear these four purple dresses in rotation. We'll see. Next year is a long way away.
What's been surprisingly easy is the no-buy. I do look at things periodically, but it's not been difficult to restrain myself from making any purchases. This has included anything personal for me: not only clothes, but stuff like hair products, so that I use up what I have. I have some gel, bought at least two years ago, that I don't love as much as the LUS Irish Sea-Moss gel that I'm currently out of, but you know --- the other day when I washed my hair, I used some of that gel, the first time I've used gel in a while, and it was fine. I won't buy any more of any kind until I've used up that tube, because truly, it is fine. And I'm not feeling antsy to pull the trigger on any purchases when I come home from the Easter Vigil (I think I might actually have done that with these Birk Mayaris last year . . .). This year I don't feel much like rebounding from that particular discipline. I do want to buy something, but I want to take my time.
I will, sometime in Eastertide, use my Wool& gift certificate from my 9x9 challenge, though I'm not yet sure on what. Part of me says: You do not need another dress. Another part of me says: There is nothing else you actually want, and it's stupid to spend money just to not buy a dress.
I was looking on the site today, as one does . . . and you know how I've kept saying that if they offered the Audrey dress in more colors, I would want another? Lo, they are offering this dress in a color called Geranium Heather. It's really hard to tell, from the picture (no model photo), what this color looks like. Also, the one review of this color notes that the fabric is really thin, which seems odd. I have the tencel-blend Audrey in Black Heather, and one of the things I most love about that dress is how sturdy the fabric feels. I am really attracted to the idea of another Audrey (my most-worn dress last year, and possibly the year before), and to the idea of that dress in pink, but I think I want to see what it looks like and what other reviews say.
Otherwise, I'm still pretty interested in trying the Sofia again when the Spruce Green color comes available sometime later this month.
Again, I don't strictly need another dress, but there's nothing else I really want to expend my one remaining "new purchase" slot on. And I would like another dress. I would wear another dress.
But it's actually a relief not to have to make any kind of decision right now. A no-buy season is kind of a gift. Lent generally, in every possible way, is a gift. I'm beginning to feel ready for Easter. I'm glad next week is Holy Week, with all its drama, and I look forward to all the joy and beauty of Eastertide, the Ascension, and Pentecost. This is the most glorious time of the church year --- but it would not be so glorious without the gift of Lent.