I am sitting in the shade of our backyard gazebo, having just watered my gardens and pulled a few weeds. The temperature is a reasonable 27C / 81F respite after a week of heat that kept me mostly inside my air-conditioned home (we hit 40C / 104F one afternoon).
Gerry is just home from a short hike in the Wakamow Valley, not far from where we live. After filling me in on the morning trek, and showing me the ridiculously huge doughnut he brought home from the Maple Leaf Bakery, he’s out in the front yard attempting to eradicate dandelions from the lawn.
Molly is wandering around, surveying the property.
And our granddaughter, Makiya, the teenager currently in residence, is doing what teenagers do. Sleeping.
I’m sipping the remnants of a second cup of coffee in an extremely non-summerlike mug that’s long since gone cold and pondering nothing much in particular. My husband, upon arriving home, asked what my plans were for the afternoon and I told him “nothing.” I have no plans other than writing a few words, poking a needle into a ball of wool (have I mentioned that I’ve taken up needle felting?) and getting lost in a book. Plans, schlans. Summer days are better when one has no plans.
There are a few women on my mind. Strong women. Smart women. Thoughtful women. Some, I know in person, others I’m acquainted with through our mutual work with the Story Circle Network. Like all of us, they have stories to tell. (By the way, supporting women in telling the stories of their lives is what SCN does best.)
I coordinate an SCN blog called One Woman’s Day featuring stories about the everyday life of women, and have done so for many years. This morning, I’m thinking about a couple of upcoming posts and the women who wrote them. I have been for days; I can’t get them out of my mind. Their stories are inspiring me to take stock of where I focus my time and energy and adjust my priorities. That’s a wise thing to do periodically and, incidentally, that’s part of the power of story.
I’m realizing that if I publish this post I’m writing now, it’ll be the second today. Is that even allowed? Ah, but the fact that I make the rules around here is part of the reason I love this online space and have no plans to move to Substack or Medium or any other similar platform. Here in the part of the blogosphere where I hang out, there’s no algorithm or censorship or (and this is especially important to me these days) politics. Just ordinary women tapping out words, sharing their lives, and enjoying discourse with friends.
What could be sweeter.
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