I know, I know. I did three beautiful things yesterday. But after I published it, I thought of several other things that I’d meant to put on the list instead of what appeared. Just too much beauty in the last week to contain in one post.

1. My folks, Rudi and I walked down to the reflecting pool from Dupont Circle to see the fireworks on the Fourth. Generally, they were nice (my favorite is always the screaming tadpole one), but the standout was when they set off more than a dozen of the weeping willow tree fireworks at the same time, creating a humungous celestial tree of life.

2. Yesterday, I planned on being lazy. It was supposed to rain, but I wanted to bike in anyway. So I figured I’d just wear my bike jersey and flip flops all day and just substiute a skirt for the bike shorts. And so that’s pretty much how I packed my bag before I left. And, of course, what should I remember halfway through the ride? That I had an off-site meeting less than an hour from then. Oops! I knew I had a spare pair of good shoes in the office, but I figured I was just going to have to go to the meeting in the jersey and sports bra. But when I arrived at work, I realized I’d changed shirts before going to the game Wednesday night and had the shirt folded in my desk drawer. It wasn’t perfect (particularly over the sports bra), but it looked a heck of a lot more professional than the jersey would have.

3. Having finally figured out a safe-ish place for a mini garden, Rudi and I bought a basil plant and two more tomato plants (to encourage the first one to bloom) at Sunday’s farmers’ market. They are currently awaiting pots to move into, but in the meantime are living on the shower caddy (where Della can’t chew on them) in the seedling pots they came home in. The Cherokee Purple tomato had one tiny green tomato when it came home with us; it now has three (the largest is the size of a cherry). It must think we will provide a suitable home.

Somehow we’re already at Thursday afternoon. I’m glad — I need a weekend to come soon. I’m just feeling a step out of time, I suppose because of the travel and the holiday weekend and all that. But I’m looking forward to the weekend to getting back on track.

The beautiful things from the last week:

1. The Mets took 3 of 4 games they played here in town against the Nats this week. I was lucky enough to get to see two of the wins (and the loss) and appreciate the fact that I can now see my two favorite teams play on a regular basis. Today’s win puts the Mets back over .500; hopefully they’ll keep up the momentum heading into the All-Star Break and come out strong for the second half of the season.

2. In preparation for my folks’ visit this past weekend, we did some cleaning. And the exciting thing about that is that you can currently see all three of the mismatched rugs we have in the living room — a fact the cats find utterly delightful.

3. I’m working on a huge knitting project and finally reached a point where I felt like I was making progress. I enjoy knitting, but it takes a while for a project to reach the point where you can actually see the object you aspire to complete. I’m not sure I’m there yet, but I can now actually see myself reaching that point.

Three beautiful things of the week:

1. Last night we had a gorgeous thunderstorm between 8 and 9 at night. Rudi and I turned off all the lights in the Burrow and curled up together on the couch (with Della) to watch. The summer we realized we had feelings for one another, Rudi and I each had a large room with a wall of windows in the dorm we were staying in. Depending on whether the storm was coming from the north or the south (and usually it was from the south, over the Sound), we’d pile into each other’s rooms and watch the free light shows.

2. The plane that was due to come pick me up and bring me home on Tuesday got stuck in Virginia due to one of those aforementioned light shows, stranding me at O’Hare for an extra three hours. Thanks to my trusty cell phone, not only could I let Rudi know he should pick me up closer to midnight than 8 p.m., but I also got to talk to Karen for an hour. If I’m going to be stuck in an airport, it’s nice to know that I can just reach out and touch someone I know, even if they’re far away at the time.

3. When I woke up in my very own bed Wednesday morning, Jeremiah was curled up on the pillow around my head. I think he was trying to make sure that bad dreams and untimely wakefulness stayed away from me on my first night home.

This week’s trio of beautiful things:

1) Karen and I have known each other for 15 years now (half a lifetime). And I don’t see her nearly as often as I want to anymore because we now live 6 hours apart. But she’s always there when I need her — for those small, every-day kinds of needs (like staying on the phone with me when I’m feeling lonely or providing a supply of recipes for my new bread machine) as well as the catastrophic needs (like helping me pack up and move my life, twice).

2) Sarah’s favorite vegetable is the English pea (peapod pea), and her mom sent her a big box full of them yesterday. And Sarah was kind enough to share them with me as I was in a frenzy packing stuff up to ship to my conference in Chicago.

3) Rudi and I have joined a summer softball rec team, which starts up this weekend (hopefully). Last Saturday, after our bike ride, we stopped at Rose Park to toss the ball around. We weren’t always accurate, but we did have lots of fun. There’s just something rhythmic (and relaxing) about the back-and-forthness of it on a clear late-spring evening.

It’s Thursday. You know the routine. Three beautiful things from the last week:

1. I had a letter from an elderly neighbor from my childhood home yesterday. She lost her husband this winter and her last two letters have included notes about how much she misses him. In her first letter she wrote that they’d been married 50 years and that it hadn’t been enough. Yesterday’s letter included a note that she didn’t understand how much you could miss someone until this happened. Remarkably sad, yes. But beautiful, too.

2. I’ve had a rough month. And Rudi’s been there every step of the way. Sometimes he loses patience with me (I do, too, for the record), but generally he is wonderful and supportive, giving me a shoulder to cry on, dessert to drown my sorrows in, and a pair of ears when I need to rehearse my presentation “just one more time.”

3. The last week has been miserably hot and humid — the sort of weather one can cope with in August or, presumably, if one lives in the Deep South. Sometime yesterday, the humidity broke, giving me a beautiful evening to sit outside and read until the light faded.

Three beautiful things from the week:

1. We went for a ride on the C&O Canal Sunday evening. Along the way we saw small bass, huge carp, lots of turtles both sunning and swimming, ducks and ducklings, and geese and goslings (including one daycare group that had 26 little ones with four adults — the littlest goslings were so funny when they tried to get out of the water — one managed to climb out about a foot before tumbling back into the water!)

2. On Sunday we also went to the Mt. Pleasant Fest. For those outside of the Beltway, Mt. Pleasant is one of the most ethnically diverse, communal neighborhoods in D.C. It has remained under the radar by virtue of being inconveniently placed in terms of Metrorail service. But they seem to have a very community-oriented vibe that we really like every time we visit.

3. My former intern Jason called this week to say that the government had approved his work visa and that he’d started his new job at a St. Louis hospital. He also raved about his new apartment, which sounds like it is located near where he works and in a vibrant neighborhood. Jason is the student I worried most about finding his niche when he graduated from Wesleyan, so I am relieved and grateful to hear him sound so happy.