Oh, My Darlings

What a day this has been. I've been going at it slowly all day long and just got the final load of clothes in the washing machine. I've mopped some (but not enough), taken trash, unpacked, watered porch plants, gone to the post office, cleaned out the refrigerator and made soup thereof and also with a few things from the garden, and best of all-visited with Lis for a few moments when she came to trade cars. I've also talked to Jessie who is sitting in the airport in DC, waiting for something on the plane which is about to carry her and her husband across the sea to Rome to be fixed.
Not worried. Nope. Not me.
And of course I've been obsessively listening to the news.
What in the world? I can't even comment except to say- I don't understand. And as soon as I heard about the explosions, I immediately headed to the kitchen to make that soup because there is nothing in this world that can calm me like the making of soup.

Mr. Moon is on his way to the auto auction and now the guy who cuts the grass is here and so instead of the perfect peace one might wish for, there is the sound of the giant mower and also a weed-whipper but I am not complaining because when they are done, it is going to be beautiful.

I realized that my wedding posts have missed a few things. One of them is that I haven't posted a picture of my Hank and how that happened, I do not know. So. Here is one that I especially like from the night before the wedding at the cookout.

My man-baby. Should I talk about the fact that he had a date his first night on Black Mountain? Oh. Well. Maybe not. Someday I am going to write a book about Hank. I will win the Pulitzer. Or perhaps Hank should write the book about Hank. Or maybe he could write the book about BEING Hank and I will write the book about being Hank's mama. We might both win the Pulitzer.
There is no one like my Hank.
Trust me, my loves. Please do.

Also, I wanted to tell you one of the things from last week that charmed my heart so much that I will probably never, ever get over it. I was watching the boys so that Lily could go do girlie-things with her sisters when Jason was still on the manly river trip and we were downstairs in the little apartment where Lily and Jason and the boys were staying. Gibson and I were on the bottom bunk of one of the sets of bunk beds and Owen was playing with a flashlight when Owen said, "Mer-Mer, let's pretend I the daddy and you my little girl."
Now this was completely new to me that he would want to play such a thing but I was all in and we began our game.
"What are you doing, Daddy?" I asked him. He took the flashlight and crawled under the bunk and said, "Oh, my darling. This bed really broken. I have to fix it."
My darling. 
Are you kidding me? My heart stopped for a moment. And then he proceeded to fix the bed and call me "my darling" for the entire time we played.
I almost couldn't stand it.
"My darling, this bed really broke. You help me fix it." And we pounded on the metal bed frame for awhile.
"My darling, it is time to go to bed." And he crawled up on his parent's bed and I laid down on the bunk with Gibson and we slept for about four seconds before he popped up and said, "Good morning, my darling! You have a good nap?"
I will never forget that. Being called my darling by my three-year-old grandson.
I talked to Lily on the phone today and she said that a day or two ago he called her "my darling" but then he said, "No. I call Mer-Mer my darling."
I doubt I could be prouder than if I had won the Pulitzer Prize.

And here's another picture of something I missed because it happened after we left the party.

Jessie and Vergil playing music together at the jam.
There. That.
Jessie playing mandolin in her wedding dress, looking into the eyes of her newly-made husband. I have no idea who took the picture (I got it off Facebook) but I love it with a passion.

What else is there to say?

But wait. Stop. I have one more thing.
I was talking to Jessie, and Vergil's grandmother, Ann, the night of the family meet-and-great-Greek Dinner and Jessie was wearing red shoes. Now Ann is an older woman. Somewhere in her eighties, at least, and she told me that she liked what I had told my daughter about wearing red shoes which Jessie had related to her, which is that a woman cannot have a bad time wearing a pair of red shoes, more than what her mother told her about wearing red shoes.
So I asked Ann what her mother had told her about wearing red shoes and she said that when she was a young woman, she had bought a pair of red shoes and when she showed them to her mother, she said to her, "Ann, there are two types of women who wear red shoes. And you are NOT a ballerina."

I can't stop laughing about that. Ain't nothing wrong with that lady's mind.

Well, that's it for now. Lis just called to tell me she made it home safely and we giggled and cried a little more. We're in some sort of withdrawal from each other. And Jessie just texted me that they are in their seats on the plane. The chickens are making their way to the roost and the men are still working in the yard. I am exhausted and happy. I can do more mopping tomorrow and tonight, my only job is to sleep. I have soup to eat and I also picked some tiny lettuces from the garden which I can make a salad of and I am still time-tripping. I am going back and forth between memories and the right-here-right-now and I am going to sleep so damn good tonight that Morpheus will be impressed and send me gorgeous dreams.

I am thinking of Jessie and Vergil, about to take off for their honeymoon and I hope that when they begin that always-a-little-scary trip down the runway, they will hold hands and kiss and know that they are about to fly off to another sort of beginning. And I am hoping that in their lifetime together, they will have many such moments because a honeymoon can be sweet no matter how many years you've been married.
Trust me.
But this is their first married honeymoon and as such, it is special.

I wish for them many honeymoons during their lifetime and in fact, I prescribe exactly that for a long and happy marriage.

Sleep well, my darlings. Sleep well.