Sometimes You Have to Throw in the Sponge

You have to listen to yourself, to your inner voice, and know when to stop. When to step back and take a deep breath and realize you've done all you can do at the moment for the task, the situation, or the day.

Since I've been blogging daily, I've been looking forward to sitting down and writing a post each night. I've started to craft sentences and turn words over in my mind during the day. It feels good, like a carpenter who looks forward to perfecting a table edge or a painter considering color strokes for a canvas. Maybe even a fashion designer who is figuring out how to finish a hem or collar.

I wanted to write tonight about being small-minded when I least expect it, about sometimes feeling dry and rotten to the core like an old apple, but I got the message.

After scrubbing all the pans in our sink--the toaster oven pan for the salmon, the cookie sheet for the taquitos, the heart pan with all the curvy crevices for the chocolate cake--I was down to the last one: the muffin pan I used Sunday to make the healthy fig muffins from Eating Well Magazine.

Then I accidentally squirted myself and my hot pink Lilly Pulitzer cardigan with soapy water. I knew it was time to put down the worn blue scrubby sponge, leave my plans for more serious writing for another night and turn in for the day, maybe watch some TV and have another tiny vintage juice glassful of Bloom, the 2007 Riesling I like mostly for its hot pink label.

See you tomorrow.