This Is How It Is

That's the only picture I've taken since last night's post. But it's pretty sweet, isn't it? Before I got up this morning Mr. Moon found another unmarred gift on the back porch right where the little mousie had been the other morning. This wasn't a little mousie but one of those VERY LARGE MICE that aren't as cute as the little ones. We aren't sure at all where Maurice is coming up with these critters. I haven't seen mouse or rat sign anywhere in the house but I'm not saying it couldn't happen. I sort of think she's catching them outside in her midnight rambles though. As long as she doesn't bring them into the house, especially not in the deepest darkest hours of the night, we are fine with these gifts. Mr. Moon said he praised her profusely and they had a long talk about it when she came and sat with him in his chair this morning. 

More rain and more rain and more rain. Started here around 10:30 and I don't think it's stopped since. I do not mind this in the least because it brings the temperature down, it is of great benefit to the flora and the fauna, and it gives me a valid excuse not to go outside to do yard or garden work and sweat like a beast. Of course you know I actually love doing outside work, even if it does involve beast-like sweating but it's nice to get a little break. I did a short tour of the garden this morning and the weeds are springing up like, well...weeds. 
The zipper peas and the white acre peas are forming their pods and peas as we speak and soon I'll be picking those. Glen wanted to plant even more than we did but I put my foot down. There's only so many of those things we need. Preparing and preserving them is time consuming. Green beans you can just snap but peas have to be shelled and that takes awhile, no matter how well-practiced you are in the art. And I freeze these peas because they just freeze so beautifully. I blanch them for a minute or so in boiling water, drain them, cool them in an ice water bath in order to stop the cooking process, and then freeze them. When it's time to eat them, weeks, months, even a year later, you can just pop those babies in boiling water with whatever you want to cook them with and they taste as fresh as the day they came out of the shell. 
Glory hallelujah! 
You can leave these peas on the vine until they dry at which point they're just like any other dried bean you'd cook. Black-eyed pea, pinto, black, garbanzo, you name it. But the ones picked green and preserved in that form have a completely different taste and texture and as much as I do love a pot of beans cooked from the dried versions, the green ones are mighty special and not a food that most people are familiar with or even aware of. I guess lima beans would be an exception. When you can find them, already shelled and in bags ready to cook or frozen, usually at farmer's markets, they cost an arm and a leg. 
Labor intensive and worth every bit of it. 

Hank had asked if I wanted to meet up for lunch today and yes, I did. Rachel joined us and so did Mr. Moon. We met at Kyoto, formerly Japanica! and had good meals. I got the teriyaki tofu bento box again and once again I thought the tofu was absolutely the best I'd ever eaten. I think they use silken tofu and the outside is perfectly and lightly fried until just crispy and the tofu within is nothing short of creamy. Nothing I've ever made with tofu even begins to compare. 

Mr. Moon is just about a newborn's fingernail clipping away from being completely overwhelmed by what he's doing for Tom. Today on top of meeting with social workers and assisted living managers, he bought Tom new clothes so he'd have something to wear in the rehab facility. Then he had the meetings and got more information that he needs. Rachel, who has worked in the elder care sphere as a social worker, had names of high-ups in the system who might be able to help Glen. That was so appreciated. 
As Lis Williamson and I agreed when we talked on the phone last week, you gotta know a guy to get anything done. 
Sad, but true. 
In this case it wasn't guys but women. Same thing. 
Glen is finding all of the rehab place's case managers and so forth are being incredibly helpful which is terrific. They're not going to kick Tom out of the facility where he is. They recognize his disabilities and his needs and seem to be on top of things. But it is a rehab facility and he's going to need an assisted living place to move into. He is going to fight this with every breath in his body and I understand that completely. I would too but going back home is absolutely not going to happen. 

I keep thinking though of how when people stand up and say their vows and declare that they will love and cherish each other in both sickness and in health, they generally have no idea of what the are promising. And when Tom asked Glen to be his power of attorney and health care surrogate years and years ago, Glen had no idea what that would entail. Yet here he is, learning and doing and fulfilling that promise. 

Oh god. This is rather depressing, isn't it? I'll try not to focus on this issue so much. It's just that it is a big part of our lives right now. 

Anne Rüsing sent me a link to an article The Guardian did on Keith Richards becoming a great grandfather and how he is living his life at the age of 82. You can find that article HERE. 
I was glad to get the article, so happy to read it. Mick has been here, there, and everywhere promoting their upcoming new album, "Foreign Tongues" whereas Keith has been rather quiet which I will admit has worried me. But in the article he sounds hale and hearty and happy and thrilled about being a grandfather, a great grandfather, and a musician releasing a new album. He also talks about AI and quitting all his vices and the time Chuck Berry punched him in the face. 

“He punched me once, years ago, in the 60s, I think. We were in his dressing room, I was having a peek at his guitar and I was just about to stroke it, and he went: ‘Nobody touches it!’ And bam! Quite right, Chuck! I would have done the same. I’ve never had to, but then I’ve never caught someone doing that.”

I have to sigh and say that I will always be a bit obsessed with this man. Indulge me or don't indulge me. As Bruce Springsteen said about Keith in his memoir, "I've come across many spirit-filled folk in my travels but no one as spectrally beautiful as Keith Richards." 

And after I read Keith's memoir, I felt that to my bones. And although I have known many, many musicians, I'm not sure I've ever met one as absolutely certain of what music has meant to him or her in their life. 
Bless him. 

And here's a picture of my spirit totem animal and my daddy. 

TWO spectrally beautiful men. 

Mr. Moon and I just did a little tour of the garden which has never looked better. We agreed that I am the garden's mama, he is the garden's daddy. 
We are both so proud.

The mixture of the carefully in-line planted seeds and plants with the volunteers is especially striking this year. We've never had better peppers, and the tomatoes are pretty damn gorgeous. The eggplant would make a mother proud. 
And they do. 

The rain has ceased for now but the sound of water dripping off the leaves is still a lovely patter-song. The birds are saying, "Goodnight! Goodnight!" and the oaks are sighing with comfort and relief. 

Martini night, clean sheet night. It's good. 

Happy Friday, y'all. 

Love...Ms. Moon