Sundays Can Be Weird

The roses are at it again. That's a bush that grows in my garden. It never takes a break unless I prune it all the way back which I did a few months ago. And oh, how wonderful those soft, fat roses smell in that old, heirloom rose way. 

I am still at home. I slept well last night and the pain today has been constant but not at all unmanageable. My goal in all of this is for it NOT to become unmanageable. Really, right now it's just continuously making its presence known in a rather achy fashion. I have been inordinately tired, though, and that's another reason to get this taken care of. I want this stone out of my body. 
Yesterfuckingday as a beloved and very ladylike friend of mine sometimes says. I will be calling the urologist tomorrow and I will be assertive in my insistence that I need an appointment as soon as humanly possible. 

But in one way this has been a tremendous day for me. I finally finished Levon's blanket and coincidentally, Vergil and the boys came over to watch Duke play basketball and I literally finished the last stitch just as they pulled up. 
I carried it to the door to greet them and August said, "Is that Levon's blanket?" "It is!" I said. And then Levon saw it and I gave it to him and he hugged it to him. "It's soft," he said. 

Look at those eyes. I think he really likes it. I told him that whenever he uses that blanket, it can be like a hug from me. And he said, "Yes," in the sweetest little boy way possible. 
So yeah, I cried. 

"Glad I got it made just as summer is coming!" I said. 
"I'm a little cold right now," he said. "I can put it on me while we're watching TV." 

A little while later this was happening. 

I guess they were all a little cold. 

Not to be morbid but things like making a name blanket for my last grandchild have become more deeply emotional. My tears come more quickly and easily than ever. It takes very little to make my eyes well up. Let's face it- the older we get, the more apt we are to be doing things for the last time. And we generally have no idea that it'll be the last time. But in this case I am fairly certain that no more grandchildren will be coming and so yes, Levon's blanket is the last. 
But I will admit to wondering about other things in the perspective of...is this the last time?
I don't think I'm going to die anytime soon unless this damn kidney stone gets me but honestly- we never know. This is as true for an eighteen year old as it is for an eighty year old but, the older we get, the higher the odds are that death is packing its scythe and heading our way. I think I accept this inevitability but do I? Is my casual musing over whether this will be the last garden I'll ever plant or if I am now driving the last car I'll ever need, a coping mechanism to help me truly understand the divine truth of mortality? That one of these days I will indeed have my last dental appointment, buy my last jar of face cream, have a last listen to the Rolling Stones, slice my last onion, kiss my loved ones...

I'm thinking of these things today because I gave Levon his blanket, I guess. The day has certainly been beautiful. Mr. Moon mowed the yard which means he mowed down the weeds and some of the invasives and it looks beautiful. We don't really have grass. The shockingly hot pink azalea is still bringing all the bees to her nectar and the wisteria has its share of bees sipping away too. 

I do believe I am seeing more bees this year than I have in a very long time and that is a good thing. Right now I'm sitting on my porch and can hear a woodpecker having its way with a buggy piece of an old tree, its rat-a-tat-tat a swift vibration of beak against wood, a pause, a repeat. I hear other birds whistling and chirping and chipping and calling, according to their own family songs. There's a little breeze that comes and goes, drifting through the wind chimes and rustling the waxy magnolia leaves. 

Keith Richards says that silence is the musician's canvas. And the artist we know as nature has all the notes, all the rhythms, all the instruments, all the dramatics, all the seductive and soothing and stimulating sounds so that if we just stop and listen, if we are in a place where we can hear all of this glory, it becomes a symphony for our souls that no one on earth is hearing exactly as you are. 

And now I feel like the Bob Ross of blogging. Do we need a happy little tree here? 

Maybe. Maybe that's what we all need right now. A happy little tree for our hearts to climb up into to be sheltered and rocked gently in its branches. 

Oh god. I need to stop now. 

Love...Ms. Moon