Sunny Days and Roses

Finally!  We have some truly warm, sunny days!  It seems to me that winter lingered longer than usual this year, with so many gray and rainy and cold days that I began to wonder if we would ever see the sun again!  Today had all the qualities of late spring/early summer:  heat, light breeze and lots of sunshine.  It made me want to think about potting plants, buying and placing lawn furniture on my patio, maybe buying a bird bath, hanging the bird feeders, etc.  I know that by August I will be fussing about the heat and wishing for some of those cooler days and maybe even for the rainy ones, but right now, I'll take the sunshine!

In addition to the summer-like weather, my roses are blooming.  The "knock out" roses are hanging full of red blooms, and will, hopefully, bloom until almost frost in the fall.  But the one I am excited about is the antique rose, rooted from the original plant that was at my grandmother's house.  My mother brought the cutting to me as a housewarming gift when I moved into this house.  I worried all winter that I would kill it, but it is full of  buds and bright pinkish red blooms.  How exciting to see a plant that goes back a couple of generations blooming again.  Just one more example of the circle of life, I guess!  I remember seeing that rose bush as a child (and I remember the vast number of thorns on it, too), and to see it blooming in my yard is truly special.  Grandma's house no longer exists, but her rose bush lives on! 

I was thinking with some disappointment again this spring of the tulips in the flower bed in Greenville (the bulbs were planted by my husband in the fall before he got sick) - those tulips bloomed every spring and always cheered me up.  It was almost like he was telling me "hi" every time I saw the colorful display.  I asked someone in Greenville the other day if they had noticed if they were blooming, but they had not seen any color so maybe they hadn't.  By now they should have been dug up, split, replanted, etc., so they may have suffered. 

So, in the absence of the tulips, it is a real joy to see Grandma's rose blooming in the glorious sunshine!

It's Rainbow Time!

Every morning that the sun is shining, I sit in my living room and enjoy "rainbow time" - a myriad of rainbows scatter along the walls and ceiling cast by the prisms in my window.  Today, as I also listen to the construction of three, yes three, houses next to mine, I wonder if the new houses will block the sunlight and block or diminish my rainbows - hope not!

What is it about rainbows?  The science teacher in me knows that the prisms (just like raindrops) refract or bend the white light coming from the sun into the spectrum of colors that make up white light: or as we learn in school ROYGBIV (Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet).  Right now I see all those colors vividly in no less than 15 rainbows!  When conditions are right after a rain we see the arc of a rainbow caused by the light being bent by raindrops - so it is just science, right?

But rainbows are also Biblical - God places one after the flood in the Old Testament to symbolize His covenant with the people.  So, seeing rainbows can be a beautiful reminder of God's promises and His presence with us.

My love of them, however, is much more personal.  I received a prism from a "secret sister" during the time my Dad was hospitalized, had surgery, and died in 1995.  All that summer, and in the subsequent years of springs and summers, every afternoon when I walked into my kitchen I was greeted by scattered rainbows, bringing a smile.  It was like they reminded me that, although I was sad and grieving, there was also joy in remembering pleasant times.  Over the next few years, I obtained more prisms, so that no matter the angle of the sun at various times of the year, at least one prism would catch the light and break it into the glorious colors.

Then, when my world totally changed in late 2000 and the spring of 2001, the rainbows added another pleasant association.  Jim could not be outside during the sunny part of the day due to the chemotherapy, but he loved being outside.  He began "following the sun" every day inside the house.  He spent mornings in the living room on the East side of the house, enjoying the sunlight.  Then, after lunch time, he moved to the den on the back side (West) of the house, so he could enjoy more of nature's glory safely inside.  By mid-afternoon, when I returned home from school, the prisms in the windows were splitting that sunlight in its spectrum of colors.  As I walked into the house, on every sunny day, he would shout, "come on in, it is rainbow time!" So now, every morning, when it is my own "rainbow time", I feel like he is with me, reminding me of more pleasant memories.

 

It's that time of year again - the temperatures rise and fall like a roller coaster, sometimes cool and crisp, sometimes downright cold, and other times almost as hot as a summer day. The shadows are getting longer as the Earth shifts from Summer to fall and the shorter daylight and cooler temps have stopped the photosynthesis in the leaves, changing the greens to fall colors. Now some of the trees are ablaze with reds, oranges, yellows, and variations of those colors, and some of the leaves are already scattering the streets and lawns. This is my favorite time of year, not only because it is my birthday season, but also because it is like all Mother Nature is raging against the impending winter by lighting the world with color. Soon the trees will be bare, and the winter winds will blow the leaves everywhere, and the world will be darker with shorter days and longer nights. I miss the maple tree in the backyard in Greenville - the tree transported from Madison and transplanted there as a sapling. Every fall it reminded me of Moses' burning bush, completely and gloriously aflame in hues of red, orange and yellow. I do have a few seeds from that tree, and may eventually try to plant them (although I really don't have enough yard for it - maybe Jimmy and Karla could plant one in their yard). I do hope it is putting on a show for the new owner and brightens his fall as much as it always did mine!

What A Difference A Week Makes!

After a busy day of sitting with the girls while Karla had a doctor's appointment, running errands, unpacking some of the myriad of boxes I still have, making beef stew, taking out the recycling for tomorrow's pickup, I realize how quickly I'm settling into a routine in the new life I've begun.

It is hard for me to believe that a week ago I was frantically packing and facilitating the loading of a moving van, and that one week ago tomorrow I moved into this new house! The decision to move came about very quickly, and I could not believe how fast the deposit was secured, the mortgage was arranged, and all the other pieces of the puzzle came together. After all, I only saw the house for the first time in November, and here I was, closing on December 28, starting to move a few things in a couple of days later, and then throwing my entire life onto a moving van a couple of days after the New Year came in!

Watching those rooms empty was more painful than I expected...it brought back memories of seeing that house for the first time, empty, 37 years ago when Jim and I toured it before deciding to buy it. Since we had rented a furnished house in New Bern, this was our first real home together. It was the house we set up real housekeeping in. It was the house where I miscarried our first child. It was the house we brought Jimmy home to when he was born. And it was the house that Jim died in. I got through the day pretty well until time to leave right after the moving van pulled away. Suddenly there wasn't enough time to properly say "good-bye" to the house, no time to say "thank you" and "see you soon" to my friend who has given me so much help and support, and no time to go by the cemetery to say "good-bye for now" to Jim...I had to get on the road in order to get to Jimmy's by dark. Needless to say, I cried off and on all the way to Raleigh.

Now I'm settling in at the new house. I've been too busy to be sad - there's just too much to do to get unpacked and organized. The house is coming together and is beginning to look and feel like home. Later, in a couple of days, however, I have to go back to Greenville to pick up a load of things (items the movers wouldn't take and I had no room for last week) to bring back to the new place...I almost dread going back into the house because I know it is going to be hard. There will be other trips back, I assume, until the house sells. This is a good move, and I am happy with my decision. Already I'm enjoying the closeness of Jimmy, Karla and the girls. But I guess that, in order to say "hello" to new beginnings, you have to say "good-bye" to old ways.

Lists!

I HATE making lists...always have...just prefer to "fly by the seat of my pants" most of the time. Yeah, I know that I get more done when I make a list, prioritize, and check off the items one by one! And, yeah, I always advocated making lists as a strategy to help my students, but I really hated doing it myself!

So, what does it say now that I'm retired, with "all the time in the world", that I find myself making lists more frequently? There is housework, of course, to be done routinely. But more importantly, there is the "other stuff"...the fun stuff like crafting, sewing, reading, watching movies, etc. Now I find that if I want more time for the "fun stuff" I have no choice but to make lists, get things done, and then do what I really wanted to do. Of course, it doesn't help that I have a really bad habit of procrastinating and another bad habit of dreaming up projects that may or may not ever get done!

Right now I'm sitting in my office/sewing/crafting room and looking at a long list of unfinished projects: several baby quilts for various friends, curtains for a friend's new office, afghans to crochet, sundresses I planned to make my granddaughters last summer still not done, several cross-stitch kits to finish (some started already, some not touched), three scrapbooks for my granddaughters that haven't been updated since the fall (I do, at least, have the photos organized, dated, etc. so that will be easier!), lots of supplies that are out because of the various projects that need to be put away, a couple of Christmas projects for next Christmas, and lots of paperwork to file/go through/throw away, etc. as well as the tax stuff to get to the accountant (it is basically ready except for one piece of information I'm waiting on)...

Whew! I'm retired...why does this overwhelming list look like WORK???

Fall & Memories

Finally, it is beginning to feel like autumn! Those hot, humid days well into October have not felt at all like fall. Thankfully, we've received enough rain and a few cool nights, so the trees are beginning to show their brilliant colors... and it's about time!

The most beautiful tree is a maple in my back yard. That tree, a mere sapling at the time, was hand-picked by Elsie Wilson when Jim and I moved into this house. She marked it with a ribbon because of its beautiful range of colors so Doc would know which one to dig up to bring to Greenville. Every fall, that maple, which stands gloriously tall now, resembles Moses' burning bush... it is aflame with gorgeous yellows, oranges and reds. And, every fall, I have a few moments of sweet, sad memories of a mother-in-law who took such care in making sure we had a tree from "back home" that was beautiful. I've actually been agonizing that, if I move in the near future, can I get a cutting rooted so I can take a piece of the tree with me? I'll have to check with my yard man to see...because I'm not sure I can do without that tree every fall.

Autumn was always my favorite season, partially because of my birthday, but also because it seems like the whole world puts on a full-color show right before everything goes dormant for the winter. Growing up, my family always took a trip to the beautiful North Carolina mountains in the fall on a weekend near my birthday. We took a picnic lunch, including a birthday cake, and rode around admiring the myriad of colors of trees in the "hills". Often we stopped at a roadside stand and bought apples and apple cider before heading home. In 1970, when Jim and I got married, I was a bit sad that I wouldn't get to do the annual trip because of our wedding. How wonderful it was when I discovered that he planned our honeymoon in the hills of Virginia and North Carolina, giving me another reason to make fall my favorite season. It has been many years since I've taken such a pilgrimage, but I find myself thinking about it every fall.

One fall, only a year or two after my marriage, Jim and I were in Madison for a weekend. Elsie was up late on Friday night pre-cooking some of the meats and preparing the vegetables. Saturday morning, a fire was built under a huge cast iron pot in the back yard, and, with the help of Doc, Jim, and Hopper, we combined all the meats and vegetables, many of which came from Doc's garden, in that pot. I can still remember the cool, crisp air combined with the smell of wood smoke and brunswick stew...the best I ever tasted. And, as cool as the weatherman says it will get tonight, a big bowl of homemade stew would taste wonderful!

Having been a science teacher, I know that the shorter amount of daylight coupled with the cooler temperatures causes the chlorophyll in the leaves to stop working and changes the leaf color. I prefer to think some kind of magic has been performed, and that the trees are refusing to go quietly into the cold, dark days of winter. They rage against that prospect with all the fire and emotion they can muster, and I love it every year!

My Own Little Palace of Versailles

Back in the '90s, I accompanied my son and his classmates on a trip to Europe during spring break. It was one of those whirlwind trips during which we covered Paris, a couple of cities in Switzerland, and a couple of cities in Germany in ten days. One of the most memorable parts of the trip was a visit, on a Sunday morning, to the Palace of Versailles, just outside of Paris. Lately, that beautiful palace has been on my mind, especially in the mornings. Let me explain.

The Palace of Versailles was initially built by Louis XIV, the "Sun King", of France. Good old Louis had the palace built so that one side faced east and the other side faced west, and he had many windows installed on both sides so that the house was brightly lighted all day. So, the "Sun King" was the center of the sun's light all day, waking with its brilliance in the morning and watching it sink into the west every evening. Perhaps it was a bit egocentric of him, but apparently the sunlight was very important to him. (I don't know that his heirs had the same feeling for the sunlight. While they added onto the palace, including building enormous English-style gardens, the symbolism seemed lost on the later generations. And, I won't comment on the attitude and downfall of Louis XVI and his young wife Marie Antoinette!)

Why the history lesson, you may ask. Well, coincidently my house, though much smaller and less grand than the Palace of Versailles, is situated such that the morning sun shines on the front and the evening sun lights up the back. Almost every morning when I get up, sunlight is streaming through the beveled glass oval of my front door, creating a beautiful pattern on the living room and den floors. Since I had a screened porch added on the back of the den, the French doors (again, how coincidental) line up with the front door in such a way that light travels straight through the house. At the end of the day, when the sun is sinking in the west, the den is brightly lighted, and, again, light travels through the house to the front room. Okay, so what's the big deal? Well, it may not matter at all to some people, but to me, that sunlight has become very important.

I've always noticed the difference in mood between a sunny day and a dark, overcast one. Even when I was teaching school, it was obvious that moods changed on those cloudy, rainy days. I did not know, however, how important that sunlight was (perhaps even medicinal) until my husband was fighting a terminal bout with pancreatic cancer nine years ago. He began, as he called it, "following the sun" every day. With chemo, he was restricted from being out in bright sunlight, so he sat in the living room in the mornings, enjoying the brilliant sunlight, and then moved to the den after lunch when the sun began pouring into the back side of the house. It was as if the sunlight kept his mood positive and uplifted him.

A week or so after his death, I visited my physician to get a "doctor's note" allowing me to stay out of work the rest of the school year (2-3 more weeks). Along with his supportive and caring manner, he made a surprising suggestion (a non-written prescription, if you will): "open the windows and doors and let the light in...for if you don't I'll be treating you for depression in 3-6 months!" I immediately began opening the blinds and the doors, instead of "hiding" in the dark feeling sorry for myself. Within a few days, I not only felt better, I found I actually "craved" the sunlight... could not get along with it!

Now, nine years later, I get up every morning, reveling in the pattern of sunlight coming through the front door, and I begin my "rounds". The blinds in every room get opened, one by one, until light is pouring in on the front rooms of the house. The blinds on the French doors are opened, allowing me to see the beauty of the trees in my back yard, some just kissed by the morning sun. Soon, when the threat of pollen lessens, I'll begin taking my newspaper and my breakfast out to the screened porch every morning, where I'll enjoy the sights and sounds of the world waking with the sun. (Needless to say, I suffer greatly on the dark, gloomy days which do, by necessity, occasionally occur!)

It occurred to me recently that, of all the things I have listed in my mind that I'd have to have if I relocate to Raleigh or Greensboro, that I had forgotten the most important: lots of windows and sunlight! Wherever I eventually live, I must have lots of natural light. Like Louis XIV, I need to be in a position to see the light at all times of the day. So, the next time I'm thinking about moving, I'll add lots of windows and sunlight to the list of property features. I can't afford the Palace of Versailles, but I can have a taste of its features wherever I live!