the stillness behind a run on sentence

 Today I am grateful for a quiet cold, a ticking clock, a ride, music, a shot at what could be, night air, your smile, and the morning after when I have to do as great as I could ever and I can already name a million ways I have failed you.

irony, the

 The I turn people off of reading stories include a group of kids who hid a book from me and streaming video. It's been a good week.

Today I am grateful for an end and a beginning.

today's coffee dialogue

You'll have this one cup and only it for another 24 hours. Then you'll have that other cup tomorrow morning. Seriously.

Stop acting like you're Atlas carrying the world on your shoulders. It will go on with or without you.

Doesn't that feel better?

Yes.

Today I am grateful for a pumpkinectomy.

footage

 He laughs. I ran from where? 

"The road down there by that fence."

Today I am grateful for that smile, those questions, his stance, how he loves to pick at her and footage.

Tuesday morning

Today I am grateful for early and thoughtful.

sweet and broken

 Sixteen point five miles in four and a half hours and an opportunity to spend my last forty-one dollars. Eleven for gas and thirty for groceries but by the time I got to Eddy's I thought I had thirty-five and we started talking and I started losing my count and then get up to pay while attempting to not write a check. By the time I get to the register I already know the apples are too much. Then I look up and there he is. I say both his names when I see him. Yes, sir. Then I remembered. The groceries but it's already over, it's ringing at over thirty-three and I look in my purse to pull out what I convinced myself would be thirty-five big ones but there was only a twenty and two fives. I hand over the check. I look like an idiot in front of him because I am an idiot. Crushing end to what could have been such a beautiful, beautiful story.

Today I am grateful that he called.

tangled

Surely it's proper to be fairly exhausted by the end of a day or week. 

Today I am grateful for a lot of steps, a shower, a couch, a pillow, a blanket, a rain, thunder and a sweater - clean and warm from the dryer.

In response, you were probably twenty feet in front of me before I saw you and immediately knew that I would walk with you two. I love how things turned out for us.

the screams of gender bias

 We made the best of it. She asked, "Did you get a picture of it? Did you get it on video?"

I laughed again. These three women in their SUV driving into traffic after I suspect rolling my car with toilet paper as if that stuff is some fist in the face of the good Lord that we'll waste it if we want. But however much they put on my car, and they didn't much and oh so neatly so that I could take it off and throw it in their window and listen as those women scream which makes me scream and we all love ice cream. You know, that kinda thing.

Today I am grateful for women, young ladies, brilliant teachers.

grow

 

I am grateful for a particular day of the week, for the colors blue and gold and for a lady who a long time ago suggested that there is no failure in this world - only an education to behold.

(Thank you for music.)

all it takes

 All it takes is two large flying roaches to hit the back door,  one bounce and the other to make it in for that momentary realization to set in that this is it - the final straw was the global plague of large, flying roaches. Here they are. 

But no, there was only two and I killed one of them.

Today I am grateful that there is not a plague of large flying roaches and your music.

whisper and crumble

 Remember when I said I'm glad you're still here?

That. Again. That is what I'm grateful for.

1500 photos

It has been written that Thoreau may have whispered the words as he wrote them. 

"I fear my expression may not be extravagant enough, may not wander farther enough beyond the narrow limit of my daily experience, so as to be adequate to the truth of which I have been convinced."

Get ready. Get mark. Get set. Go. Is that even the order it goes in?

Today I am grateful for extra batteries, an extra card, extra steps, and so much extra love. I'll forever be saying thank you for that.

breathing autumn

 

Yesterday won the absolute ever best hiking weather. 15 miles and the feet feel it.

Today I am grateful for sand and dirt and tracks and trees and air and sun and earth. 

selling puppies

 A change in the lights, a dramatic effect. We wash someone else's notacar. We only wash cars, we decide but not before finishing the job. It was her who did it and we talk about how puppies force us to use the wrong pronouns and the market saturation of hounds.

Today I am grateful for the sun and the wind and the air and walking with friends.

what would be missing

 everything if mama didn't know.

We needed it - a perfect temperature on a field and a win.

I am grateful for a ride and a sideline and a message and a win.

balance

 There would have to be moments in the 36 kid scenario - which I guess if one woman subjected her body to creating a human every year for 36 years and still lived through it, Mount Everest would be nothing - when you hide around a tree, in the bathroom, in the deer stand, everywhere just so you can calculate what the groceries would cost each week. What would the refrigeration run you? What is the cost for all that love? I love my one. It's why I borrow kids from other people. You don't have to feed them.

And in response, what I can tell you is that there have been moments over all these years when my mama says my name in the way I know she means business and our eyes meet before she states, "Balance." Balance is hard for me, too, but I'm coping and you certainly help. Thank you for being here. 

Today I am grateful for coffee.

girls night, aka borrowing someone's kids

 We assume the position of two in one chair with our legs and feet stretched out on a gigantic ottoman. If ever there was a perfect Wednesday night, this is it.

Today I am grateful for Moana and the girls who recommended her to me.

In response, Junior Kimbrough, as best I could tell, may have had the most perfect brilliant tension in a string and a note. There is at least one evening every spring and every fall that when you open the back door his voice and his guitar will cause those tiny hairs on the back of your neck to you know. Your shoulders go back. You listen. I think he had 36 kids.

You know soulful, sultry music. I'm saying Kimbrough on the threshold between house and porch in the fall under lights is number one all time movie making music.

yeah

 Thank you.

all it takes is one step

What if we go one step too far? I always go one step too far. I can tell you about so many steps I should not have taken but each of those was the last step after many or next is Junior Kimbrough. You pick.

Today I am grateful for a book, a phone call, laundry detergent, running water and a knock at the door.

mocha blast without whipped cream

 

It could be a little funny that I thought we were doing that. Sharing a pot of coffee. Now I feel like I can't do this without you but anything more, I do fear, would ruin us.

Today I am grateful for us and this. Are we better or worse without this? I'm clinging to something.

in response

 when he turned around, looked up and said, "And I'm the only the one who can do it."

That's when we laugh. 

Seger came on when I took Getwell all the way to a sign which read Love Road. I remembered Love Road and it seemed right though I was a bit lost on a drizzly Sunday morning and maybe I needed to remember how nice it is to ride and listen to your music. Eddie, yes.

cheat

 

Two Baskin Robbins blasts - the first was a medium but the second was bring it on and an afternoon spent with kind strangers at Cracker Barrel. Two slices of Rotel on top of pizza and a bowl of four different flavored scoops of ice cream and special crackers and big blankets and amazing chairs and I consumed enough salt and sugar and process foods to swell a bit. This week I'll spend extra time with extra water walking everywhere so I can do that again.

Today I am grateful to be home.

hill country

 

Today I am grateful for eight women, some good music and a lovely road trip. 

Memphis

 Sweeeeeet, in response.

What about road trip music?

Today I am grateful for familiar faces.

free

 It is possible and most probable that I would consider my own comfort when considering my opinion. And I think that's what I love about that Saban quote. Did he even say it?

"I don't have an opinion about anyone else's opinion."

Today I am grateful to sleep till 6:00, have a two-hour kitchen run and plan for a short trip in the rain. Surely tonight will be amazing.

Got anything for the playlist?

rhythm: foot mileage needed

Less energy or more expended. Just tired maybe. And the wasp sting grown but only after a night of straight shooting a heavy lens for a couple of hours. I'm finding excuses to get out of my rhythm. So a break?

Yeah, a break would be nice. Fire in the barrel early this week.

Today I am grateful to be able to get out in even a rain. 

Yeah? Yeah.

there's that

 Breakfast is the meal and there's that pie. I gotta get it to him this morning. I am or am no longer saying it's the best one yet. I'll let him tell me. It may be too sour. Lots of vitamin C, I'll say. 

He'll smile before he pleads, "No more. Stop!"

Today I am grateful for this time in our lives.

In response, you are not only fine. You are beautiful. Thank you for being here.

before you kill me

Winner of my favorite place on the internets is the comment section of this blog.

Also, venison chili. Please don't shoot me by the river before I finish the chili and have at least one bowl.

Today I am grateful for you and food.

The morning's music is Shine Eyed Mister Zen - the entire album. Could we get Kelly Joe in a live concert before you kill me?

scooch in response

 You have this music knowledge that somehow has led you into what is pure and unadulterated southern gospel on a Sunday morning with Seasick Steve. When we dance to him we pace. And then that was turned into a lean so heavy my shoulders went up and back. Yes, I love how you move me with music. 

As you know, anonymous, I am grateful for you.

Good morning, love. Coffee? Music?

around the barrel

11 miles through the land of the tiny frogs

 

We'll need a sleeve, a jacket, maybe some music.

Today I am grateful for a shared experience.

doing the homework

 Less about the content and more about the practice is the teaching. Two and a half hours sitting in a room in the back of a building at the top of the hill. I've only done it once but I think I should do it again.

Today I am grateful for that opportunity and all those others out there today.

recovery time lessened

 What feels like a wasp sting, much like a burn, begins when I throw a trash bag on Monday. By Tuesday same spot like a skin outer layer heat straight up as if a wasp has stung me but still no wasp to be found. Three days and the frequency has lessened and was never anything I couldn't stand. It was just one of those hm. You know.

Today I am grateful for 50 hills, pear trees and learning to let go.