dual personalities

Spring is here and the Florida Room is open for business. I worked all day on Saturday, taking everything out of the room, cleaning it, cleaning everything, moving it all back. Then I moved all the plants in. Phew, was I tired when I finally finished.

I deserved some refreshment afterwards.

My friend Carla came over on Sunday for an inaugural SP21 visit to the Florida Room and we gabbed away, catching up–sans masks. All these little steps seem like a bigger deal these days, don’t you think?

The wee babes came over after that and frolicked outside. Running down the hill,

playing velcro catch,

driving the Cooper,

drawing the solar system on the driveway,

and so on. All the fun stuff. Pappy barbecued a feast of hamburgers and hotdogs. We had ice cream sandwiches for dessert.

And I have to say, after a work week full of rain and dark skies, there is nothing like sitting in a folding chair on the driveway in the sunshine watching the wee babes frolic.

Consider the subtleness of the sea; how its most dreaded creatures glide under water, unapparent for the most part, and treacherously hidden beneath the loveliest tints of azure. Consider also the devilish brilliance and beauty of many of its most remorseless tribes, as the dainty embellished shape of many species of sharks. Consider, once more, the universal cannibalism of the sea; all whose creatures prey upon each other, carrying on eternal war since the world began.

Consider all this; and then turn to the green, gentle, and most docile earth; consider them both, the sea and the land; and do you not find a strange analogy to something in yourself? For as this appalling ocean surrounds the verdant land, so in the soul of man there lies one insular Tahiti, full of peace and joy, but encompassed by all the horrors of the half-known life. God keep thee! Push not off from that isle, thou canst never return!”

Herman Melville, Moby-Dick