July 27, 2025

A nice calm rainy day alone. 

Woke up to nice gentle rain.  I sleep better without the a.c. when its cool enough.  Rain did wake me up, but it sounded so gentle this morning.  Unfortunately, the air quality is so bad my eyes are pretty swollen, but basically, the rainy cooler weather has been relaxing.

My yard has become a huge field of Queen Anne's lace.   The back yard is covered in it.   I need to go back there and see how the roses are.  It's been weeks.

Went up to the rookery around 5:30.  It was 71 and rainy.  There were geese and kingfishers and a black bird high up in the trees.  The red winged black birds were silent.   Very little sound up there, not even the rain was making sound.  The haze is thick.

I've been missing people who are gone today.  I wanted to talk to Mike and I spent time thinking about Mom.  But who I thought most about today was my old friend, Mike Dockwiller.  I think my Jamaica Kincaid books he borrowed in 1991 never got returned.  LOL    Mike is a potential character in a book, I think.  He died several years ago, young; had a heart attack at an MLA conference in Boston.  I didn't hear about it for years. I went to try to contact him to get my Jamaica Kincaid books back and found his obituary.   Made me cry for a week.  

Mike and I were in an airplane flying to Ca. when Bush sent bombs to the Middle East. We went away  together for 10 days, had a good trip and never saw each other again.  

The barn was covered in swallows and goldfinch.  The goats must have been keeping dry.  The weeds in front of the goat space are high at the moment.  But we need this rain, it will really help.  I love this barn.  

The milkweed is podding.  I haven't found any cocoons, yet.  I was hoping there would be some to photograph.   I need to cut everything down at some point, but I kind of like watching it over take everything else.  

It's like a curtain that you have to walk through to get in the house.