Reflections in Early Morning

I write in the stillness of early morning. 6:24 a.m. My daughter sleeps and my husband hasn’t gone out yet. I have stolen some extra minutes–minutes I normally spend snuggled in bed, my legs against Ivan’s, head on his chest–stolen those minutes for time in the quiet where I can write.

At 6:00 a.m., the window in front of my desk was dark and the light from this room made a reflection in the glass: me with hair falling on either side of my ears, books lined behind me in the light pine bookshelves Ivan built, the mess of books and papers on my desk. That mess developed during the six crazy weeks of my final college class. I am not in a hurry to clean it. That mess signals that I am relaxed and at home, that the self-improvements I tried to implement during the first two years of my marriage weren’t completely successful, that I have relaxed and morphed into a new version of my old self–and I am glad. Old self, old friends are most comfortable.

The reflection is almost gone now, blended into the heavy old pine outside my window as the morning sky lightens and steals the window image with wispy fingers. Damp fingers, I might add. Two drips fall past the window, in steady succession from the eaves of the house. The door creaks as Ivan goes out to chore.

I have neglected you all, neglected this blog while I finished that class. But it is done now, and I am ready to move on. I am glad to be finished with college for now. Because it is an online class and I finished mid-semester, I won’t graduate right away. I will have my commencement in Lancaster in August or December. But I will still graduate in 2022, just like the Sattler classmates I started with. I am pleased about that, as smugly satisfied as if I’ve had the first bite of a chocolate bar or managed to flip the calendar page on the first day of the month.

I will be working very hard and heavy on the CLP creative writing curriculum I’ve been neglecting. In deference to my responsibilities there, my blog posts may change at this point, become less planned-in-advance and more early-morning-spur-of-the-moment. Like this one. I will pull bits from my freewriting or write the things that pop into my head as I write them. I will keep them short and sweet….or long, if long is easier. I will return to my original vision for this blog, to capture the bits of story that make a life.

Movement, sound, color. And sometimes, a story.

Speaking of story, I made an Orthodox Jewish friend who is a writer from the Bronx in New York City. Living in the Bronx is so romantic, I told her. I think she thought that was funny. I took her to Saffiticker’s (the local ice cream store) on the golf cart to give her a country experience. When she left for the airport, she left behind her bagged baby cucumbers and sheep milk cheese–items I never buy at a grocery store. The normal mundane of her life is exotic to me, the normal mundane of mine exotic to her. That is the beauty of wide-ranging friendships.

And her interest in Plain living is one of the reasons we became friends. She had an idea for an article about Plain women writers. I agreed to be in it. You can read the article at The Atlantic. I think she did an awesome job.

I just heard the door creak, and then the desk chair. Ivan is in, and I need to go make breakfast. Talk soon.

P.S. I forgot to write about the feature photo at the top, but it is Annalise united with her Grandma Dorothy. We flew to Iowa for a brief visit and to see them together was so sweet. Ivan says Annalise has a contented expression on her face when she plays with Grandma Dorothy that he never sees on her anywhere else.

Here are two more fun summer pictures I love: a baby-sized ice cream cone and Annalise disposing of a bunny.