This same time, years previous: Captain Morgan’s rhubarb sours, crock pot pulled venison, people watching and baby slinging, help, a burger, a play, and some bagels, ’twas an honor, raspberry mint tea, garden tales, part one, garden tales, part two, and talking points rained out.

Just to drive home my point about the rain, here are two photos from yesterday. They were taken (by my daughter) about ten minutes apart in the early afternoon.

This morning I was playing with this first photo, thinking about switching it to black and white, and then I was like, Um, why? It’s already totally gray. Rain really does take the color out of life.

And then, a few miles down the road, brilliant green and almost sunny.

Virginia weather is crazy.

It’s scheduled to rain all next week, I hear. But the next week? TONS OF SUN. Can’t wait!

PS. It’s Friday and I’m still upright. I planned my week carefully, scheduling at least one social interaction for each day. My I-need-people plan continues through this weekend and right into next week. Go me.

PPS. This is sort of a non-post. I apologize. I will be back (who knows when) with cookies. Peanut butter and chocolate are involved. Sit tight.

PPPS. Come to think of it, maybe this is a good time, what with the rain and the upcoming weekend and all, to share book/movie suggestions? Yes? Okay then! I’ll go first.

Reading: Currently, On Acting, by Steven Breese, and next up, Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson (for book club) and A Tree Grows In Brooklyn by Betty Smith (reviewing it to see if it would be a good family read aloud).

Watching: Seinfeld (because some friends gave us a bunch of seasons for our broken-back son), Catastrophe (because a friend mentioned it on Facebook), and House of Cards (I’m a couple episodes short of completing the show). As for movies, I’ve recently seen Brooklyn, Spotlight, Concussion, and The Big Short, and I’m wanting to see The Lady in the Van, Eye in the Sky, and The Intern.

Your turn! What are you watching and reading?

This same time, years previous: on getting a teen out of bed in the morning, the quotidian (5.12.14), maseca cornbread, two quotidians, lemon rhubarb chicken, rhubarb sorbet, and bald-headed baby.  

Soon after we got home from the hospital, a nurse from our congregation phoned to make a suggestion. Back when she was a beginning nurse (or maybe even still in school?) this woman had worked on a floor for children with scoliosis. At that time, treatment for scoliosis consisted of requiring the children to lie flat on their backs for six months, can you even imagine?! These kids were given special glasses—prism glasses—so they could read books that rested on their stomachs while still lying flat on their backs.

“You might want to check them out for your son,” she said.

The glasses sounded like a joke. Prism glasses? I imagined frames with sun catchers in place of the lenses. How in the world could a person read through those?

But then I looked them up, and I was like, Oh yeah, mirrors. I ordered a pair straightaway, but I kept my expectations low. The glasses sounded gimmicky—they didn’t cost that much—and I doubted they’d work all that well.

Turns out, the glasses are amazing. You really can stare straight ahead and clearly read whatever it is you’re holding in your lap!

My son uses them all the time. I’ll walk into his room to find him flat on his back, his laptop balanced on his clamshell belly, watching a movie or studying his EMT text while staring up at the ceiling. It’s wild.

Prism glasses…who would’ve thunk it? (And why didn’t they tell us about these at the hospital?)

This same time, years previous: the quotidian (5.11.15), one more thing, lemony spinach and rice salad with fresh dill and feta, hummus, and the mother of his children.