16 months later

What I'm listening to: Big Yellow Taxi by Joni Mitchell 

Sixteen months - a pandemic. A pregnancy. A newborn. And toward the end, a single car for a family of six.

There wasn't a desperate need to get John's car fixed since I knew we wouldn't want to be going many places in the dead of winter with a brand-new baby in the midst of a pandemic, but last month we finally did, and since then we have been out of the house nearly every day. I am starving for activity, much like I was starving for delicious food after I was deprived for nine months during my pregnancy with Wilder.

I've been finding such joy is the simplest meals lately. My body craves - endlessly it seems - strawberries, chocolate,

avocado, salmon, toast, eggs, and chai tea. So I eat them. At least one of them, every day. 

There were so many unknowns at the beginning of last spring; it was most disconcerting having no clue how long businesses would be shut down or how long we'd have to go without seeing loved ones. I missed doing simple things, like getting a coffee at Starbucks or walking from shop to tiny shop downtown. Joni said it best - you don't know what you got till it's gone.

And on top of those unknowns, what was most certainly known - that my early pregnancy would all but shackle me to my bed. I missed spring. As in I totally did not see spring last year. I went to my bed one chilly evening at the very beginning of the season before it had yet had a chance to show off, and when I returned to society, it was hot, muggy summer.

I missed the trees' transformation from skeletal and brittle to bursting with leaves like long locks on the heads of old women who know secrets. I missed the cool, blue-bright mornings damp with dew and watery sunlight. And the colorful parade of tulips and daffodils, adding charm to even the most dismal corners of the city. 

I so very missed spring, that this year, with the realization that I hadn't seen spring in two years, it was utterly enchanting. I planted my first garden this year and every sprout and leaf that has burst forth has been met with almost worshipful enthusiasm. How incredible that an entire plant can come from a mere, tiny seed! And I did it! I put that seed in the ground and watered it and talked to it (surely that must have helped) and witnessed its growth! Life is a miracle! 

 

There is just something magical about watching a tiny seed that you planted - you! who always claimed to have a black thumb! - sprout into a baby of a plant to a towering eight-foot flower-tree. (And then something else entirely to see that flower-tree knocked down after a night of wind and hard rain, ripped from its roots before the rest of those baby buds had a chance to open. But that's a sad story, and I'm here to tell a happy one.)

My carrot tops are bushy and untamed, but I'm not sure how many carrots I'll be able to harvest because I forgot to thin them out after planting. (Actually, I forgot to thin out all of my plants, except my cucumbers and squash.) My tomatoes have doubled in the past week - they are out of control! I'm not sure where to even begin in pruning them, but right now their wildness makes me smile. My beans are the infants of the group, reaching spindly arms to whoever or whatever will be strong and sturdy, then growing up and up, kissing the air with delicate white flowers, grateful and smiling.

I know they say not to personify nature, but I find the personification of my garden as my children a delight, pure delight. I find my actual children to be a delight, as well. Motherhood has been sweet.

We have already spent countless days swimming in my parents' pool. I realized a few years ago that I don't actually enjoy swimming, but even I have swam this summer. 

Mixing textures and patterns is one of my favorite aspects of home decor. Metallics, leather, fibers, curling leafy plants. It's something that happens effortlessly and beautifully in nature: the rough bark of trees, crumbly, dark earth, velvety petals of flowers. I think this is why the mixing of different textures works in home decor. We crave what occurs in nature. We are of the earth, after all.

I like how my big girl's long legs match the long limbs of the tree she is hanging out with.

I have plans to visit many parks this summer, although it feels that it is slipping away already, though it is only July. Do we really only have two more months left?