Spring is very confused today. The wind chill was 35 degrees this morning. I had my air conditioning on yesterday. Technically, my AC might have still been turned on this morning, but since it was 64 degrees in my apartment when I woke up, and the AC was set on like 75, it wasn’t blowing. Now I have the heat on. I’m sorry I’m not sorry.
One thing spring is not confused about is raspberries. I am normally more of a blueberry/banana/apple fruit consumer, but they were out of blueberries, and my mom always says the important thing is to eat colorful food, so I bought raspberries. I’m not sure if these were particularly amazing raspberries, or if the fact that I ate nothing but white bread and mayo last week had something to do with it, but I can’t remember tasting anything so delicious. I felt like the kids from Lord of the Flies who are starving and find the tropical fruit (mangos maybe?) and can’t stop themselves from gorging. But then I remembered that those children felt very sick afterwards and that each raspberry cost about a dime, and I tried to limit myself to no more than a $1.50 in raspberries in that first sitting.
In other news, I ran out of flonase this morning, and I called the pharm for a refill. The nice lady at the pharm said,”Goodness! You sound terrible! Rough time of year, huh? I figured while I was out of allergy medicine, that I should sweep all the pollen off of my front porch. Not like, the yellow gritty dust, but the hairy oak pieces. I’m grasping for a better way to describe the oak debris, it sort of looks like mini caterpillars? Or maybe a yellow dust bunny? Debris is one of my favorite words. Spring time brings a lot of extra debris. My car looks like it hasn’t been washed in two years. It’s been more like ten days. Even Briscoe is sneezing.
Despite the fact that there is a windchill today, yesterday was hot and muggy and rainy and the mosquitoes were having a grand time. Briscoe and I went for a walk around 8 yesterday morning, and we sat down on a bench by the water, and I looked down, and there were at least five mosquitoes trying to bite Briscoe through her fluffy hair. We came home immediately. How do you keep mosquitoes off your dog?
I was home in Augusta last week for the Masters, and it was a whirlwind of friends, family, flowers, sandwiches, beer, and pollen. I attempted to see as many people as possible, and I still missed some important people. The amount of white bread and mayo consumed was upsetting, but necessary. My friends from home (The “A” Team) and I discussed how the Augusta National is like Narnia, how the grass is greener, everything tastes better, life seems crisper. But you can’t take it home with you. Egg salad does not travel well. The pairing sheet is just a dirty piece of paper when you get home. And this week, apparently, the end of the Masters means the return of the endless winter.
My childhood buddy, Lilibet, has written an excellent book – Box Girl: My Part Time Job as an Art Installation. Check it out, it’s totally hilarious. And if you need any other book recommendations, The Goldfinch was insanely awesome. And The Circle was an engaging and terrifying look at social media.
Briscoe and I happy to be back in sunny Charleston, but it was hard to leave home after such an amazing week. The first couple of days after the tournament are pretty rough, but I think I’ve made it through the worst part. I hope that you are all surviving this STUPID cold snap. This has to be the end of it, right? It’s not fair to have pollen and a wind chill. Winter can’t last forever. Until them, I recommend hot coffee and zyrtec, and a fuzzy dog if you can find one.
*I also posted a post below that I wrote about a month ago, but forgot to actually post. Finishing the drill is hard sometimes.
the thin line between optimism and delusion... 