A friend of a friend of mine is a gardener/landscaper/nature freak type person, and she came out to the cottage on Sunday to take the lay of the land and tell us what we could plant with our black thumbs that wouldn't die. I have had green thumbs that were a result of dyeing, but that's not the same. Still nobody finds that joke as funny as I do. ANYWAY. She gave some advice, we listened and were grateful. When she was leaving she mentioned the street where she works, which is the street where a different friend's husband works. "Oh," I say, "his son is my son's circus teacher!" And she says, "So you're the Anne that took M on the road trip across the States!" Yes, my friends, I live in a village.
At the cottage I was so unbelievably tired so early that I thought all the newly awakened insects were bearing malaria, and cast them glances of great aspersion, though they sluzzingly insisted they were harmless. I went to bed at an unheard-of 9:30 p.m.. When I woke at 5 it seemed suspiciously light, though Squire hushed me back to bed while he stoked the fire and made coffee. After the coffee I realized that when spring springs forward, it not only awakens the bugs but also advances the clocks. Which we had neglected to change at the cottage, and which do not change themselves. So. I'm not saying a 10:30 bedtime on a Saturday night and a 6 a.m. wake-up the following morning doesn't mean I am an old, old woman: it just means I'm not quite ready to take my teeth out before bed.
Oh, and before we went to the cottage I picked a total fight with Friar. He is a difficult person to pick fights with but I gave it my level best. I kept him up 'til about 2 a.m. Friday blazing my tirade and then started fresh on Saturday morning like I'd just had my eyelids slit and was ready to go all in. Childhood pain was invoked and also a moderate dollop of pure, grown-up nastiness. I fight in an even tone, I rarely veer off the topic, and I give my opponents time to finish their sentences, but my hand is never off my sword. Sorry, but I think weapons metaphors might work better than boxing, about which I know one movie's worth. Fortunately for Friar, he is an expert parrier, having studied his Agrippa, and so by the time we were walking through the woods to the cottage we were all laughing and well. And in my case, getting ready for sleeping sickness.
And what else? Only six more weeks at the high school; I went today to tell them ever so politely "never again". If I ever learn that when I say "never" the first time I mean it, I'll probably be able to solve all the world's problems with all the brain space I have left over to learn new stuff.
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