September brings schooldays, the first flush of color in the leaves, crisp apples, cool nights, and for me, at long last, a return to writing posts for my site. It’s been a while. I wish I could say visits with family and friends kept me too busy to blog, but though there was some such fun, I spent most of my summer dealing with household disasters.
Things have been falling apart around here left and right. The catalytic converter and anti-lock braking system went on my husband’s car, the dishwasher started to leak, the toilet broke, and for a completely unrelated reason and yet almost simultaneously, so did the water treatment system. We had to replace a punctured tire on the mower, a cracked tile and warped heatshield in the woodstove, and the foot unit on the elliptical. Then three weeks ago, I tripped while running, landed on my face, and snapped my brand-new glasses. Ouch. [Read more…] about Summertime Havoc
My pottery studio’s impossible to keep clean. Basically, clay’s just fancy dirt. But this summer, even if I can’t finagle spotlessness, I’m determined to organize the space. I’ve already started with my glazes. Some of the glazes I’ve unearthed I hardly remember. But they were buried for a reason. Invariably, they cost a pretty penny, were a pain to mix, and, when tested, proved disappointing. The walnut glaze, for instance. I vaguely recall it fired to a hue less nutty and more brownish blah.
The daffodils are in bloom, filling the flowerbeds and meadow and trimming the woods, like bonnets of pure sunshine. Such cheerful flowers. I love spring!
I spent a good chunk of the 1980s listening to Prince, Madonna, and Duran Duran, puffing up my bangs, feathering the sides of my hair, crushing on Tommy Howell, wearing leg warmers, reading Sweet Valley High books, and watching certain films—Flashdance, The Pirate Movie, Airplane!—over and over again. Omnipresent in my tween years was something else, not so much a sight as a collection of distinct scents, the clean note of lavender, the heady sweetness of rose, the spiciness of pine, orange peel, cinnamon sticks, and cloves: potpourri!
If there’s one thing my house has a lot of, it’s pottery. My kitchen cupboards, of course, are stuffed with dishes I made. My office has become a conservatory filled with plants, partly because I love plants but partly because, well, you know: planters. My kids’ rooms haven’t escaped the invasion and hold teapot sets, piggy banks, lamps, candle holders, cups for pens and pencils, and jars for craft supplies. In every room, many pots serve their intended functions, and in every room, many pots don’t. There are teapots acting like bookends, decorative pots masquerading as junk drawers, water pitchers holding spatulas, and vases with bouquets of paintbrushes. 
I love this time of year, when purple and white asters flank our road and the trees put on a glorious show of copper, scarlet, umbers, gold, and that luscious, luminous red like the blush on a peach. Even the sky has a fall-ish look, with great clouds tumbling across the bluest blue. October makes me glad I live in the country, nestled in the woods. It beckons me outside to see the sunshine in the foliage, leaves sweeping the cold air, mushrooms dotting the moist soil under the canopy, and geese stitching the sky and honking overhead. 
I spent the first half of my summer revising a manuscript. It’s in my agent’s hands now. I have nothing new underway. No outline for a novel, no notes, not even an idea. 
I live in the woods, but there’s enough of a clearing around my little house to let in some sunshine, so flowers and shrubs can grow. Only three trees occupy the clearing: an oak in front and a maple and an ash out back. The ash stands closest to the house, by the screened porch and outside my kitchen window. I’ve appreciated this closeness. For the nearly twenty years I’ve lived here, the ash has been a good companion.