Sunday 4/14/24
It seems of late that I am always awake and yet I've rarely been tired. I must attribute this in part to the way I have been eating and also of course my drive. I should "keep an eye" on this, though, as it is dangerous not to get enough sleep.
There are daffodils all over the city for Patriots' Day, both planted and potted. Yesterday I saw many people--more than on any other day of the year, save the Marathon, of course--on runs in Boston. Quite a few of them had on shorts or windbreakers with Marathon logo so clearly they were tuning up for Monday's race. The early days of spring also bring out the runners. One sees those who normally do not exercise getting some exercise in. Is it simply on account of winter being over and wishing to take in the warmer weather in some vigorous, almost grateful way? Or is it the decision that now is the time for a focused fitness push?
Yesterday afternoon I sat by the harbor with a volume of M.R. James's collected ghost stories. The sun was that kind of bright where even when you are not fully out in the open--an overhanging bush gave me a bit of shade--you squint and struggle to see the pages and try to get as many words in as possible when a passing cloud obscures the rays. I was doing just that when it began to rain despite it being so bright moments before and then had to take cover--less so for myself than the well-being of the book.
My mother went to tea with my sister and Lilah, my niece who is turning eight soon and for whom I got that book the other day on the stories of some off the great ballets. My buddy Amelia was supposed to go but my mom told me she "decided to do her own thing," which makes it sound like she went to a yoga class and then grabbed a smoothie on the way home. I had given my mother a message to relay to Amelia--that I had encountered the little ghost girl the other day and she was asking where Amelia was--so that will have to wait to be delivered.
I have always loved flowers. As a kid, I found trips to the greenhouse to be enchanting. I liked wandering about. There was the smell of the place, this ambrosia comprised of so many blended parts, but as if you could still pick out this from that; one felt to be both enclosed in some protected glen but also moving about through this fecund spot with bags of soil and spades and clay pots ready to pitch in and add to the growth and maintenance of life; life in evidence before you, and life that happened without witnessing, for it was not like one could see all of that growth grow, if you follow me.
