I grew up in the Christian faith, which means that when we get near the two major holidays, I have feelings of extreme nostalgia. Not necessarily for organized religion, but for cultural markers, like candlelight carol services and hymns I sang during my six years in choir. So, as I’m writing this, I’m listening to Enrico Caruso sing Faure’s “The Palms,” to scratch that particular itch. Our church was big enough to support four choirs, and “The Palms” was the only song we sang every year together. I associate it with crowded pews (it was also one of the few Sundays a year when even the balcony seating was packed) and soaring sopranos and being a part of something bigger than myself. It’s the same feeling I get at the ocean and listening to certain harmonies and visiting the Reading Room at the British Library and the Library of Congress. (I assume others have similar feelings when looking at mountains and the stars.)

I mentioned that yesterday I felt a little of the weight that’s been keeping me down lift a little, allowing me to make progress on some long-lingering chores. I also took myself out to lunch down by the river, started a book, did some grocery shopping, and visited the garden.

Today was a less productive day from a housekeeping standpoint, but still relatively pleasant. While early-arriving rain kept me from doing the work in the garden I’d meant to, it did not keep Rudi and me from the farmers market (and Rudi’s presence meant he went and emptied with the compost, while I waited in line to get in). I took a nap, wove in yarn ends on my pair of stripey socks and knit until I started making errors on the other pair, read, chatted with my folks, and watched women’s basketball. I ordered a calendar-year refill for my organizer, and because I put that off for a quarter of a year, it was half off. And the grant that I thought I’d need to spend all the wee hours writing turns out not to have been due this weekend, so after checking my schedule for tomorrow (and seeing a time-sensitive email I’d been waiting for had finally arrived on Saturday), I was able to put that aside and veg out with my book a little longer instead. Now, I’m going to wash today’s dishes, hang up the handknits still soaking in the bathroom sink, and join Rudi in bed.

I hope you had a nice weekend, too. Let’s carry it over to the workweek, okay?

I washed the bathroom sink today and put handknits in to soak. And I took out the kitchen trash.

There are lots of things I didn’t do. Every floor in the house needs cleaning. (Periodically I kick over the cat’s water dish and have to wipe it up, but short of relocating Corey’s bowl all over the apartment, I don’t think that’s my best bet.) The fridge needs sorting and Mount Laundry threatens us with avalanches while we sleep.

But all those things needed doing yesterday and I had no clean wool socks, my kitchen trash can only stayed closed because it had a bag of groceries perched on it (oh, I put those away, too), and my bathroom sink looked like a prop from a 1980s movie set in a New York City bus terminal.

Honestly, these were such minor things to feel good about getting done, but I got them done for the first time in a while. And I could choose to feel guilty about the state of the apartment and stress about how much work we need to do before anyone can next stop by (no one has stopped by in 16 months). Or I could take the win and recognize that I looked at several things that needed doing and actually just did them.

I don’t fool myself into thinking this will be an everyday occurrence. Honestly, pretty much any workday barely sees me doing more than basic self-care. But even if I could do a couple things every weekend (clear the coffee table or dust away the cobwebs by the window), it would be a step toward righting the ship.

But for today, I’ll admire my mostly empty trash can and go hang up the socks that should now be clean in my shiny bathroom sink. After all, every sunrise starts with a single ray of light.

I am so fucking sick of Zoom* meetings and Zoom events and Zoom happy hours and Zoom funerals.

*Feel free to substitute any other web-based video conferencing software here. I do not feel any better when my meetings are on Teams or Go To Meetings or any of the others.

(And, yes, I’m so lucky I’m able to take advantage of these platforms and work from home and still see people and listen to fucking eulogies, but I’m just fucking done.)

I spent a good amount of time outdoors this glorious first weekend of spring. Saturday afternoon, we wandered down to the Georgetown waterfront and sat and read and talked and ate snacks. Rudi made homemade pizza and we feasted on my cake (we’re down to a slice each tomorrow). I looked through some photos and sent some off to friends, so they could enjoy them, too.

Today it was so warm I was able to go to the farmers market in a tshirt and with bare legs. After a tasty late breakfast, I traveled over to Capitol Hill, where one of the nurseries I like is found. I picked up a couple of strawberry starts, as well as some other plants, and then got in touch with Sarah, who lives nearby. We checked out a new ice cream place and spent an hour sitting in the sun chatting. I metro’ed back to our side of town and decided to stop by the garden while there was still light and plant some of my new seedlings. I got two herbs, two salad greens, and a container of baby leeks into the ground before the sun slipped low enough I decided to call it quits.

The evening was spent watching the UConn women with Rudi, reading, knitting the toe decreases on my sock (I just have to kitchener the second sock and weave in the ends tomorrow!), painting my nails, drinking cocoa, and doing a little rearranging.

How was your weekend?

Wishing you all a truly happy spring with the opportunity to be outside and together with those you love.

I absolutely plan to be asleep at 5:37 a.m. EDT, but will be celebrating the arrival of spring in my dreams.

Once I wake, here are some other ways I’m hoping to mark the weekend:

• Tracking down strawberry plants for my garden and doing another planting of peas
• Reading
• Finishing the stripey pair of socks I had lingering on the needles before Sock Madness began
• Eating cake (I baked a sour cream and blueberry jam cake after Rudi went to bed and then ate two slices!)
• Making some space in the living room (I signed up for a series of pilates videos for the next 30 days and need to shift things around enough to do them)
• Spending time out in the sunshine
• Watching women’s basketball
• Having homemade pizza (unless we decide to metro up to our favorite pizzeria)
• Painting my nails
• Finding photos of our friend Jerry for his Zoom memorial service

How will you be spending the first days of spring?