Sweetness And Agitation

Despite the fact that there is nothing I have to do and nowhere I need to go, I feel agitated. As if there SHOULD be. As if I don't even know what to do with time of my own any more. I felt this as a young mother all the time- if given a few hours to myself, what would I do? And what can one really do with a few hours anyway?
And here I am now, with at least most of a weekend of free time before me and I am wallowing in indecision, not doing anything.
I could go buy material and start making quilts for Owen and for his coming-up-sibling. I could clean the house. I could weed the garden. I could clean out the hen house. I could simply sit in the sun and read a book if I so desired.
The house definitely needs cleaning. The quilts need to be made. The garden needs weeding. The hen house is filled with poop.
Read a book in the sun? Are you kidding me?
I must take a walk.
I can walk and read at the same time, the reading, of course, done with my ears.
That I shall do. And the hen house. That I must do.
The rest?
I don't know. I sort of want to walk around with a giant garbage bag and just dump stuff in it. Bits and pieces of life that do nothing but clutter my house, my soul. That would be a start.

Where does this agitation come from? What propels it? Everything I think of to do just seems so overwhelming. Too big for me. I can't chop things up into small manageable pieces anymore. If I started cleaning one baseboard, I would be weeping and on my knees until midnight. If I sat down to write a few pages of a book, I would be despairing at the loss of a dream until I died.

Well. That's not what I wanted to write today.
No. And I promise I have not been being coy about this good news. It was just not really mine to broadcast until I asked permission and let me say that I am VERY good about asking permission to write about things in other people's lives because I do respect privacy very much and that's just the damn truth.

But here you go:

Last week, before she came to visit, Jessie called us to tell us something. It was a good thing. A very, very good thing.
She had asked Vergil to marry her.
He had said yes.
Now- this is what those two decided a long time ago- that they would BOTH propose. That it was silly and sexist to expect the man to ask the woman without the woman asking the man.
Jessie and Vergil have been talking about such subjects for quite some time now. Honestly, I think that the second they truly looked into each other's eyes for the first time, they saw the faces of the babies they would have together.
You know what I'm saying?
You do, most likely.

So. Jessie asked Vergil. Vergil said yes. Vergil will propose at a time and place of his choosing. Jessie told Vergil that he has to ask her daddy for permission before he proposes to her which of course, is sexist and silly but it's sort of a joke and sort of serious, too. But Vergil will do whatever he wants because he is that sort of man.
He is, in fact, the sort of man you would want your daughter to marry.
That good.
That fine.
That able to love and be loved.

I am so glad that he's engaged to my daughter. I can't wait for her to be engaged to him too.

So here's a story I didn't ask permission to tell but I'm going to tell it anyway:

When Jessie and I went to see my mother while she was here, Jessie told her granny about asking Vergil to marry her. Mother was happy about that. She likes Vergil a great deal. And she loves Jessie so much and wants her to be happy. She told Jessie that if Vergil doesn't ask her to marry him, she should deny him sex until she does.
My mother is eighty-four, y'all.
But Jessie just laughed and said, "That would be punishment for ME."

Heh-heh. Times have changed. Thankfully.

And that's my story. More will be revealed as time passes.

Mr. Moon called me last night. He made it to Tennessee safely. It didn't freeze last night. The chickens are running around in the yard, the day is passing. I have done nothing. Vergil is engaged to Jessie.

There. Life.

Friday.