Holly's Homecoming Day

This will be a jumbly portrait of the day, July 3, 2007. Holly is coming back from nearly two weeks in Rhode Island where she went to celebrate Quinn and Madeline's birthday. She'll be here at 10:30 tonight. It will be 12:30, the time she's used to now.

Holly said yesterday that she's not really homesick, but she misses the mountains, Marty and quesadillas. So I made sure there was cheese, and will buy tortillas this afternoon, and Keith willl get a case of refried beans at Costco this afternoon.

She called earlier today and asked me where I was, because she had called the house and no one answered but I answered my cellphone. I was in the hottub, cleaning it, so she asked if I was planning to heat it. I hesitated and said it's been 102 degrees, and she said she wanted the hot tub, so I said okay. I make a call to see if I can get her picked up by a few of the younger kids (Marty and crew) who might be willing to pick her up at the airport and then sit in the hot tub with her, after the quesadillas at 11:00 or so. This might or might not work. If not, I'll pick her up and sit with her. I don't have the local social updates she needs, though, not many of them.

When I woke up too early, 4:00, and was out laying out the hot tub drainhose and pulling the plug and spotlighting cockroaches to squish them (quietly, in my own backyard), a car engine started in our driveway. I went up to see if Marty was leaving, or Kirby, or if someone was stealing a car, but it sounded too new and tuned to be any of our cars. Turns out it was a friend of Marty's, and when I walked around the house Marty came out the front door, and we managed not to scare each other.

Marty went to sleep. Keith got up at 5:00 to go to work and told me Marty's supposed to work on armor at Steve's house at 10:00. I went to sleep, Dermod called (I was awake, but not up, at 9:30) which was good, because I wanted to make sure Marty was up; he was.

After a while Marty called me from the city parking lot near the courthouse, to say he was there to show up for the citation he got for being in a city park after hours. He was getting cold feet, and I felt bad for not being there with him so I coached him and encouraged him a bit.

Yesterday I found a dove's egg in the side pocket of a backpack in the library. A mourning dove had gotten stuck in there because the dog can open the door but not close it, and though I let the dove out a window, she spent a day or two (poor thing).

I don't think this is how it is at everyone's house, and I'm glad it's not this way every day at my house, but I do like having a life where things happen, and the things are more often interesting than awful.

I've read back over what's above and I might know why I like this life, or why this life is likeable. I don't have a schedule for cleaning the hot tub, I clean it every week or so, when there's a good day or a good reason. Being awake at 4:00 on a day that was likely to hit 102 degrees was a GOOD time to start early. Nobody was mad at Marty for being awake at 4:something in the morning. Keith was undisturbed that I was up and Marty was freshly abed; he knew Marty wanted to get to the armor making session and had faith that he would. Nobody shamed Marty for getting a citation for being in a park. They were playing on cool, steel slides on a hot Saturday night, and had the option to have stayed at a party where they could've been drinking, but they weren't. I didn't say "no" to Holly about quesadillas or the tub. No reason to say no.