Back at latitude 33.8

Ah. A day of settling in. The mail has been sorted and for most part shredded. The bills are paid and the checkbook balanced. The washer's pulled steady duty for most of the day. And a good dose of Febreeze, and a little airing, has made the dirty laundry suitcase servicable again. One golf-turned-fishing towel was so awful --not to mention still smelly-wet from Saturday evening's rain -- that on Sunday morning we left it for the Shining Falls washer and to another angler who somewhere along the way loses the one he or she brought along.

While looking at photographs yesterday in the Winnipeg airport -- we have several hundred as you might imagine and yesterday we had several otherwise unoccupied hours, I discovered how to rotate vertical photographs in the program Blogger uses to upload images. (That pesky right-click is the key.) I really like taking vertical shots. While you might not have noticed, all the photographs I've used the past two weeks have been horizontal. This one isn't anything spectacular, but I'd remembered to stick the polarizing filter in my pocket that day and the clouds please me. When is see it, I'm transported back to that spot, the erstwhile sun making an appearance and our simple lunch tasting so good.

It's hard to describe how different I feel when I'm away from home. This time, for several reasons -- and blessedly, it didn't quite end AS the time away drew to a close. Although I was sad the last two days at Shining Falls Lodge, I was able not to anticipate the leaving quite so much as normal and able to focus on the moment. The "being away" has lasted right up until the regular routine resumed this morning. Indeed, while we accomplished quite alot today, Tal and I guarded ourselves, running errands together, for example, so as to continue enjoying the companionability of this memorable and sweet vacation.

I've determined that one of the most important things I can do is to continue looking at people, situations, encounters here in Edgefield County the same way I did for the past 13 days. I have been ready to be fascinated at every turn. We have delighted in the people we've met along the way, from the clerk in the drugstore in Pine Falls (who gave me a pen inscribed with "Stolen from Pine Pharmacy") to my seatmate between Chicago and Columbia last night. Can my "fresh" eyes last? Can I keep from returning to that heavy sense of drowning in the demands of life at home and at work? Can I expect the best? Can I enjoy my life? I am hopeful.

I'll end this entry with one of the nicest sights I had from the deck of Cabin 4: Tal at ease, having moved a chair to the dock as evening fell on Family Lake. No to a fish at that sitting. But, yes to being at peace -- for us both.



PS All the socks are washed, folded and back in a nice pile! Where shall I take them next?