It’s so quiet on our street this morning. MUSICA. All the windows in our house are open, it’s a beautiful dry day. I’m writing this letter (’cause it does seem a lot more like a letter than a “blog post”) standing at my computer (standing! no more sitting for me, computer is perched on a box on my work-counter) across from an open window to the street. I just looked up because I heard the gravely footsteps of a runner going by, other than that, it’s all birds.
T R A N Q U I L I T Y
Yesterday Joe was gone all day, he took part in a sailboat race with friends. I took advantage of it, stayed home and had the whole house to myself. It was another gorgeous day just like today, I left all noises off, no musica, no radio, no TV ~ I just listened to the sounds of summer while I painted for my new book.
I wanted to show the rose hips that come from the wild roses that grow next to the dirt road where we go on our walk, because, aren’t they beautiful?
Painting and writing this book is a true joy for me. I don’t know what I will do after it’s done because it’s so much fun ~ well, that’s kinda not true, I do have a little idea for what we’ll do after it’s done . . .
I think maybe I’ll have all the writing done by the end of August. Maybe the whole thing will be done by next spring, God willing and the creek don’t go dry, or whatever that is. And then maybe we’ll (Joe and me) take us all on another vacation, since we’ve been so good! What do you think of that? Do you feel like making another “crossing?”
Pray that the creek don’t go dry.
L a m b s ! O M G.
Oh Danny Boy, the pipes the pipes are callin’ me, from glen to glen . . . and down the mountain side . . .
I also made delicious Gazpacho (←click for recipe) yesterday, some for us and some for my girlfriend Martha because it’s Gerry’s (her husband) favorite . . . If you feel like tasting pure sunshine and health, make this. Try to find organic tomato juice and organic vegetables ~ it makes you feel so good that afterwards, and I know this for a fact, you will lay down with your book and take a wonderful little nap.
I put shrimp in it too, the giant ones. I went to the fish market to get them, and this is what’s growing in the parking lot. Just your basic parking lot display.
So, when Joe got home, we decided we really need to be there when the “Super Moon” came up at 8:14 pm so we got dressed up (a little, by that I mean I put on perfume (Chanel #5) and he put on my favorite, Old Spice) and took ourselves out for a wonderful dinner with a view of the pond at a restaurant called Saltwater. Then we went looking for the moon.
I could never in a hundred summers get tired of this. We’re out at our best viewing position, on East Chop with the most unobstructed views. Although I’m sure it was gorgeous no matter where you were ~ right?
One of these days we should plan to be out there in a boat for one of these big moons.
There were a few little clouds, but that only made the colors and shapes more interesting. See the little airplane up there?
We had the telephoto lens on one of our cameras, but this is how it looked when we pulled back. I have to say, it’s much prettier when you can smell the water and hear it ripple and feel the breeze and see the colors without a lens between it and you. But this is pretty nice too.
I tried so hard to get the moon in the same photo as the ferry, but that ferry was going too fast!
The light on the water. This is summer on the island . . . these little pink sparkles.
So we hopped into the Fine Romance Van (oh yes, we still have her) and followed the moon into Oak Bluffs to take pictures on the harbor.
I moved! This one is out of focus, but I thought you’d like the little dog in the boat.
Here we go. Much better. Those little close-together cottages you see straight ahead ~ just under the moon ~ are the outer edge of the Methodist Campground where they have Illumination night in August.
This is Beatrix Potter with her pet bunny, what do you think? See any resemblance to our wild bunny below?
Same ears, same alert eyes, same nose! Two days ago Joe was working out back and this little guy came bounding right past him and settled in the nearby shade of a weeping cherry tree to cool his belly in the grass, waiting patiently for Joe to move the sprinkler away from the choice new grass he had just planted.
He is our in-house lawn mower. Lunching on our baby greens. Isn’t he beautiful? I love how the light shines through his ear.
Love how his legs are all stretched out in the shade, just a lazy bunny day. See the carrot?
I’m taking pictures and Joe is throwing carrots. I got this one in mid-air! The bunny did not seem impressed. I began to wonder if the whole rabbit-carrot thing was just some made up fairy tale, maybe bunnies laugh at us behind our back “what’s with them and the carrots?” . . . but when we went out later, bunny gone, carrots gone, but grass was still there.
Jack just saw something out the front window, peeled out of the studio, tore into the front hall and up the stairs, toenails clicking the wood, to follow whatever it is he saw from window-to-window. He makes me laugh. My job is to make sure all the windows are open. Anyway, our bunny ~ he was a very nice model.
So that’s about it around here at old Branch Ranch. Things are good. Sheets are on the line, moving gently in the breeze, sprinkler is throwing sparkles in the air across the garden, robins are grazing on the lawn, a little old model T just turned the corner outside the window . . . and now I get to go back to my writing. I wrote the ending to the book the other day, and of course I cried. Happy-joy tears and sad ones too, from feeling so lucky and then the part where life happens when you least expect it. You’ll understand when you read it. I’m still adding details, some menus and recipes, some dialogue, mining my diaries for the juicy bits. (which of course then I leave out 🙂 )
Speaking of writing, I’ve had several people ask me recently if there’s anywhere they can get the original snail mail Willards I sent out years back. And yes, they’ve been bound into a book, I keep meaning to mention it although we’ve had this book in our webstore for a while ~ if you’d like to read them you can go HERE.
Also, the new Blotter Calendars have finally arrived. Kellee announced it on Facebook a couple of days ago, so probably some of you know already, but I promised to mention here, so here they are. New year, new format. Yay. Let me know what you think!
You’re probably wondering where Jack is right now. There he is. I said, “Jack?” He looked at me, those eyes say, “What??? Is it time yet? Do we get to go shoot the rubber band?”
“Yes, Jack, it’s time.”
He’s out of here like a shot, I better go catch up!
Bye Girls and Boys, have a wonderful day! Here’s some “Goodbye MUSICA” to send you on your way. ♥ XOXO
knew what other damage Hurricane Arthur might do. There were some grim predictions. The news media was saying Martha’s Vineyard was inside the “cone of uncertainty.” (If you can say that with an echo in your voice, you will probably understand how it sounds to people inside the cone.) Uncertainty is such a scary thing. All we knew for sure, before the hurricane came, is that it was HOT. Hot, Humid and Miserable.
reports put them in a little bit of a panic. We were lucky because we live here so we had a perfectly lovely day. I climbed into my time machine and wrote on my book for a while, and went through old photo albums sorting photos to be scanned for the book including the one I took of the tree that fell on my house in the hurricane of 1985. I marked sections from my diaries that I hope to include. I took pictures for this post while Joe tinkered at his workbench in the barn — later he went across the street to visit his sister and keep her company so I took advantage of the moment and mooshed into the sofa with the cats and watched Miss Potter for at least the 37th time (that’s what Joe would say) while the wind blew and the rain washed over us. It was coming down harder than ever when we went to bed. I hoped we’d still be here in the morning. That cone of uncertainty hung heavy in our dreams . . .
you think? I imagine the people on board feel like they just stepped into a movie. What if this was your first time ever to arrive on the island? Wouldn’t that be unforgettable? This is the work of the Vineyard elves I told you about in one of my first books. Running ahead, putting visions like this out for anyone and everyone to see. I might have been homesick when I first moved to the island, missing my friends and family in California, but once you know about the elves, it’s very hard to leave.
can’t tell you how much I wish I’d gotten a photo of so many things, including the HUGE bowl of fresh strawberries, the other HUGE bowl of whipped cream and the platters filled with shortcakes they put out for the dessert buffet. 
afternoon, I’ll be speaking, signing A Fine Romance and answering questions at the West Falmouth Library on Cape Cod ~ You can read more about it 
