Yesterday, I mowed our front yard. This strange patch of land consists of various grasses, weeds, and wildflowers. I believe we are the only ones in the canyon that actually have a green "lawn." I would rather have something else, some sort of groundcover or just plain red dirt/sand like everyone else. Half of this will die by June, the other half I will water all summer long, but it will never look good. Since we have no neighbors that might be bothered by the way our "lawn" looks, I just do the best I can with it and let it go at that.
I checked the lilac bush and saw that the flower buds have grown since the last photo. I worried about the storm that I knew was on the way. Snow promised to 4,000 ft, and that's us.
As I sat down to rest on our front porch, I noticed the sunlight playing on the hills across the way. As the clouds rushed by, the pattern changed and it was truly beautiful. It felt peaceful to sit there and watch. I thought about my friend Jane who just went to NYC. I thought about the city that I have only seen from Newark airport the last few times I flew to Sweden and haven't visited since the 1970s. Then I realized that this coming weekend, it will be a year since I spent a day with Jane and her husband at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books at UCLA. That was the last time I was in LA and it is only 100 miles away!
Thinking about cities, it crossed my mind that while I miss both Stockholm and London often, I don't think about LA or New York at all. I sort of wondered why, but let it go, glad I'm happy with where I live now in this rough and strangely beautiful canyon. You get to musing about all kinds of stuff while sitting on your porch, that's for sure. But all I wanted to blog about was springtime in the canyon yesterday and then this came overnight:
I'm tired today from all that work yesterday and glad the weather is so crummy not even the dogs want to go outside. I always feel slightly guilty when I don't take them for a walk, but today we'll stay home, close to the fireplace.
