Bees Sting, Owls Watch

Moey has three younger brothers, and this photo is by Ryan Cassidy, the son of her baby bro, Jimmy, born when we were in fourth grade. I hadn't seen Ryan in a while but last night, he showed us some photos on Moey and Ted's deck. He is gifted. It takes a close, patient and quiet eye to capture nature like this. LMK if you need a wildlife image. I will send you Ryan's contact info. Photo copyright Ryan Cassidy.

Summer stung like a bumblebee this year in many ways. But the details are too personal to publish. 

Still, pollinators are good, so maybe this sting can turn out to help our family somehow grow and reseed. IDK. Take the stinger out, follow a winding path to eventual flowers or dripping golden honey?

It takes great effort to step back and accept. Risky behaviors, unsafe choices. I hope and pray, but that only goes so far for me. It doesn't give me endless serenity and trust. I can't change the past--not my own flawed behaviors and certainly not the teenager's early god-given road.

So what can I do? I can apply salve (I took a bath with a luscious Dolly Moo bamboo & blue tansy bath bomb today, smells so good and clean and the color is so pretty). Even combed on a little black mascara, swiped on Prada lipstick, dipped into Bobbi Brown beachy nude cream eye shadow. I can take a peaceful nap. I can continue to love even when I do not want to, or think I possibly can. I can follow a code of tolerance and love. 

I can judge and criticize less.

Yesterday was Moey's bday. Dan and I went over to the deck for thin crust pizza, vegs and dip, chilled shrimp and to sing happy birthday. Her parents are 87 and 86 (ck); I can't believe it. When they had Moey 63 years ago, Mr. C. was 24 and Mrs. C. was 23. Ted was there (Moey's husband), their fun, smart son, Kevin, and Ryan Cassidy, their nephew. He is into wildlife photography. Look at that amazing photo above!

Well, I might watch another episode of "Emily in Paris" on my laptop now.

Good night.

I enjoyed Friday night with Figgy. I wish I had a good Spice photo 

but she won't take pictures with us too often lately. I sunk pretty Papyrus unicorn bday candles into this vegan Jeni's Lemon Bar ice cream for Figgy. I wish they had sugar-free, for me. (The website says $12 but I found it at Wegmans on sale for $6.99.)

Postcard to Self

Cap't Cass Seafood, Rock Harbor, Orleans. It closed during the pandemic; a new owner is remodeling it. Can't wait to get another clam roll. Photo by Meggy. Check capecodchronicle.com for "New Owner Eyes Spring Reopening For Cap’t Cass Restaurant."

The view from Salt Pond Visitor Center terrace. A tonic.

With Meggy at the Audubon.

Ornithologist James at the 8:30 a.m. bird banding program.

Highland Light, Truro. Photo by Meg.

Dear Present and Future Alice,

You had a great time this week. You drove to the Cape with Sis in her Connecticut car. As the promised land came closer, you looked for cranberry bogs to the right, on Route 6 East. Each mile driven was another measure away from drama and fear over teen struggles. You filled your lungs, unclenched your heart and breathed. Dan was good to hold down the fort for five days; school was in session.

Meg and Greg came from Vermont. You all took so many walks. You had two dinners at home (Meg made jambalaya and Sis, chicken with lemon, shallots and kale) and ate two dinners out. You enjoyed calm companionship and conversation.

You put your feet in the sea, let the water swirl around. You stood tall. Your gaze held steady on the horizon. You picked up a rock tumbled by the waves and a broken clam shell, souvenirs. Broken shells are better because they are real, like imperfect life. Jagged maybe, but still beautiful.

The pink and white salt spray roses smelled sweet. How resilient they are, how plucky. Blooming by the rugged sea, thriving by saltwater, churning and rough. Honeysuckle perfumed the air on the paths. You saw old touchstones from childhood. Coast Guard Beach. Salt Pond Visitor Center, with that hidden, unchanged museum. Scrimshaw and a whaling captain's top hat, recordings of Wampanoag stories, an empty wooden cradle, a primitive bicycle. Memories of Cape Codders gone by.

Now, home. You can't pour from an empty cup, the young DBT therapist, E., said this morning before starting a telehealth appointment with Punch. You had mentioned your time away, and E. had approved.

The bathroom mirror. You looked in the bathroom mirror up there on the Cape, where you have sought the truth and judged your beauty since age 19, when the house was new. Then, no makeup. Now, mandatory concealer and brow pencil. Mascara. Then, longer hair. Now, shorter, and colored. Skin crinkles. It's okay. It's all okay. The secret to beauty is accepting yourself.

You saw yourself there as a young mother and wife, with Dan and Figgy. All the things you did with them. Your short white nightgown with thin straps and scattered flowers, you turning the faucet, adding the bubbles, filling the tub for Fig so she could drift to sleep clean and fresh. Then Punch as a restless baby, never tired. Dad, of course. Friends and their children.

Already, less than 24 hours back home, the stress meter is up. Problems don't vanish. You're not saying that out of self-pity, or for sympathy, only out of self-truth. But you do not have to amp up the stress.

Remember your cup. Remember to fill it. 

Love, Alice, age 62

Selfie.

Ranger-led lecture on lobsters.

Meggy, dear friend and roommate from Douglass College, with her camera.

Sis looks good in that hat!

Beautiful Things

Beautiful bleeding hearts; image from home.howstuffworks.com.

It was a rough, challenging day again in some big ways. I hope we can make it through. But it was beautiful in others:

• Figgy's visit to Pratt Institute in Brooklyn to see a world-class art school--thanks to my friend Cathy, who teaches there and drove Fig in at 6:45 A.M. 
• Clean sunshine and energizing breeze. Perfect for boot camp in Brookdale Park with my friends. Laughter there, too.
• A morning walk with Sug--we even stopped to listen to the creek flow, me and my dust- mop girl--and a later walk with Sug, Barbara and Benz past the Iris Gardens.
• Bleeding hearts growing near our garage. I clipped a couple of shoots and put them in my grandmother Alice's pretty blue vase, on my desk.
• Phone calls with two experts with insight.
• Laundry dried on the rack outside, by the basket of purple and yellow pansies.
• Nap on couch. 
• Emails exchanged with my Sis.
• Work. The tapping of the keyboard, the stirring of thoughts, the hunting for and knitting together of facts to strengthen an article pitch. The furrow I can feel between my brows, because I'm concentrating.
• The cannoli-flavored "pudding" I made in my parents' glass goblets for dessert--with local, farm-fresh ricotta from Whole Foods, Nielsen-Massey Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Bean Paste, orange extract, a couple tablespoons heavy cream, a couple tablespoons confectioners sugar, a shake of cinnamon and some good quality dark chocolate chips.
  
• H. at the dinner table with me and Fig.  The patience and commitment H. and I conveyed--could be considered a new way of saying grace.
• A talk on the phone with someone kind.

 Good night. Let's all open our windows and let the breeze stir the curtains.