It has been a good weekend. Grief for Luca still hangs like a shadow. It is not the day-to-day absence that aches; it is remembering that this is forever. I think of the shape of his velvety ear, or the endearing joyful loyalty in his eyes, and my heart clenches, and the tears come.
But life goes on. You have to be able to hold the whole enormity of love, and still be normal.
And this weekend has been life-affirming.
Erik and I have been more homebodies than usual these days. We tend to weigh up the cost of an outing vs the equivalent amount of fun we can conjure at home, and going out so rarely seems worth it.
We have been living in a world of warm vegetable casseroles: tomatoes and squash and mushrooms all together, with cheese or a sauce, and something starchy. The garden is in its bounty. Pumpkins swell on the vines.
And the wheel turns. It has been 60s and 70s and cooler in the evenings, most days. We sleep with the windows open, and cuddle under a double Decker duvet. Erik and I have both noted how we are getting better sleep than usual.
Last weekend it rained all weekend, and it felt right to hunker indoors. We spent hours trying to catch up on the inside of the house: dusting and deep cleaning carpets.
This weekend is golden and glorious.
Last night, we stopped at the Flats’ first Friday, and while there were discussions of an evening of adventures with Lizzie at our side, we went home instead.
Erik put a fire in the fire pit. We sat up and talked and drank whiskey.
You know those conversations you have at twenty-something, in some quiet eddy on the edge of a party. The unreality of alcohol and the late hour adjoin like lenses, making this the realest, deepest conversation you can conjure. After, you always share a tinge of emotional intimacy with your companion, no matter how casual the acquaintance.
What a gift to have that same flavor of conversation, at 40, with my husband! I just love sitting and talking to him. Our conversation runs from birds and dinosaurs, through late 90s alternative music, past regrets and imagined alternate universes. There are comfortable slow currents of silence, between conversational rapids. (How Matt’s death has brought rafting into the context with which i view the world!)
I fell into bed, relaxed and so comfortable in my piece of the world.
In the morning, Erik made breakfast: bacon he cured, eggs from a friend’s flock of chickens, fried potatoes from the garden. It is so good and satisfying to have so much agency over the things that add quality to my life.
I dressed in my best work clothes: olive green overalls, white T-shirt. Hair in two braids, tied back under a green kerchief, with a straw hat atop it all.
While Erik worked tirelessly in the back yard, wrapping up cleanup on the oak limbs brought down by the last storm, Lizzie and I went out to the garden.
What a gift today is! It is the pivot when it feels ok to clean up a bit: no one is in their last scramble for winter food and shelter. There may even be time for a spring garden!
I trimmed back overgrown marigolds, cosmos, and sunflowers. I pulled up handfuls of grass that had taken over. I groomed the pumpkin vines. I cleared paths from the overgrowth.
As I worked, I felt immersed in this world I’d created. I remember my favorite games as a child were so often “imagine I made this world, and there were herbs and magic and bonded animal companions?” And here I was, immersed in such a world. I will pick these vegetables and they will, for real, be made into food to feed my household. I have carved this magic space, for myself.
As I worked, neighbors stopped by. Hector was out walking his beagles. He thanked me for the tomatillos I’d given him, tucked into the empty egg cartons I dropped on his doorstep. He said he’d bring by some more eggs later. I told him to let me know when he wanted pumpkins. We compared storm damage and swapped Intel we knew about our new mutual neighbor.
Later, Jay came out from next door, and he and Erik and i stood along our shared property line and discussed cars (and the buyer of the long-abandoned house).
Then it was Al, across the street, who wandered through the enchanted sunflower forest, and he came by for a chat. Erik joined us. They talked chainsaws.
At some point, a family biked by. The mom shouted that I had a beautiful garden. I thanked her. She pointed out the sunflowers and pumpkins to her son, and said they looked forward to watching everything grow. She’s using my garden to help her kid understand where food comes from.
I thought about what she said, that it is a beautiful garden. Sure. It is perhaps more wild and chaotic and unkempt. But it is *beautiful* because it is mine, and it is unique. It expresses a point of view. It is not neutral. And on adulthood, at least in the community I work to curate, that full-chested authenticity seems to be enough to create beauty.
This life, with the garden and the kind neighbors, is a blessing. While working today, I thought a bit about what a “blessing” means as an atheist. It is, stripped bare, just some combination of luck and privilege. (What is privilege but luck on a macro scale?) But still, it is holy. I deserve none of this, more than the people who have less. The least I can do is live in gratitude.
Eventually, Erik and I both wrapped up our chores. Lizzie had been a good girl all day, keeping quiet company in the garden. She didn’t bark at pedestrians or dogs as they passed! She just hung out. (She was on a long lead looped around a post.) But she needed some fun! And Erik wanted pizza.
We showered and got dressed for a casual date. I was pleased with my outfit, though I don’t have a picture. I have this linen dress with red and gold and blue Paisley print. It sings “end of summer into fall” to me. I wore that with a blue linen blend henly over, tucked into my brown leather obi belt. Accessories included an antler hair fork (carved with geometric patterns) and a mix of amber and lapis jewelry.
Erik and Lizzie and I went to the big dog park. She ran and played fetch. We kept to the easy walking areas, since we were in “date clothes”, but it was still a good stretch of the legs.
After, we went to Momo’s, and tucked ourselves up in a corner of the patio. Lizzie was glad to find a big dish of cool water, after her adventure! Then she laid nicely by my chair. Word spread quickly there was a “sweet dog” outside, and Lizzie regally received a succession of restaurant employees who respectfully greeted her.
I never expect my dog to greet every human who asks. If Lizzie wasn’t into it, I’d step up to stop them immediately. But she’s happy to meet someone, and lick their nose, and get her butt scratched. You have to approach softly; she is put off by boisterous behavior. But if you meet her with calm sweetness, she’ll reflect it right back.
Dinner was wonderful. Hunger is the best sauce, and I’d had hours of garden labor and a long walk since my last meal. Conversation with Erik flowed easily, as ever. We put extra effort into the banter to give privacy to the other couple on the patio, who were having very intense conversations Erik and I worked hard not to over hear.
We talked about our tomorrow. I said “we don’t have plans, do we?”
Erik looked at me, a little surprised. For a beat, I wondered what I’d forgotten. “I need to bake bread,” he said, “and smoke the bacon.”
“and we have to go to the farmer’s market!” I exclaimed in return.
I love living a life where I am able to pour such labor into making it possible, and to have Erik pour in beyond what I can match!
Through dinner, Lizzie was perfect: calm and relaxed beside me. Taking in the world with no stress.
This is, literally, my dream of dog ownership: to have a dog who slots seamlessly in my life, so that they can just go everywhere with me. Handling a dog park adventure and a fancy dinner date in one outing?? Ideal.
And she in no way detracted from dinner. I didn’t have to soothe her. She wasn’t a distraction. But when i wanted, I could reach down and touch her head. What a dog.
Now we come full circle. Erik made another fire on the patio. He is sitting and reading. I pulled my hammock up near, and have been typing this there, tucked under a quilt. Lizzie naps on the egg chair.
And still Luca’s presence is felt. He hated fire; we never would have had one two nights in a row if he were still here. We had to balance our desire for rustic coziness with his emotional well-being. Our life moves on without him, and this new chapter will be different.
Yet: May this life, with its little perfections, endure.
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