chaotic miasma

Carrots from my neighbor's garden. Who knew carrots came in so many colors? Small and sweet.

Baby is back! She's grown so much. Neighs in a high-pitched tone. 

She's curious. Spent a long time exploring a rototiller left in the grass. I watched her sniff it, lift her front leg to touch it -- and then get tangled up in the arrangement of handlebars. Eventually she figured out how to extricate herself and trotted away. She wanders further from her mother now, but they are always looking for each other and don't stay apart for long. It's lovely. The other horses are back too, still kicking and nipping each other.

next?
Suddenly the next two weeks of my life are chock full of responsibility and yet another publishing deadline. I am totally looking forward to my friend's visit next week and hoped that I'd be completely free. As it stands, I'll have to continue juggling. Fortunately she has lots of friends here whom she hasn't seen in several years, so will be catching up with them at various times during her visit--while I go to editing meetings and other things.  The family dynamic is still prominent. I received today a "wire" recording made more than 50 years ago of my nephew John, his grandparents, me, my boyfriend. His brother (who wasn't born at that time) sent it -- a cacophony of voices with a dominant, "bye bye daddy's car" and something about grandma's cuckoo clock. I haven't heard that recording since it was made and it felt like yesterday. The tyranny of time strikes again.

Good long gossipy lunch with Maggie at favorite El Gamal restaurant -- mid-eastern, organic fresh. Falafel and hummus, Israeli salad, lemonana (lemon juice/mint/crushed ice).

On her recommendation I'm reading Pen/Faulkner Award winning novel, The Great Man by Kate Christensen. Ostensibly centered around the death of an elderly renowned male artist, it's really about the women in his life. One reviewer said the characters "break the stereotype of the aging female protagonist". Yes! I started it this afternoon and am only a third of the way through it, but find Christensen's writing as sharp and discerning as promised. I don't know much about this author, but her photo shows an attractive younger women. How does she know so much about aging? The way we feel when we look in the mirror? The way we feel we could start a new life, but know we won't get it.