Pictures From the Summer

As requested, of food (and other things I love).



David picked these for me while I was digging up glass bottles from an old dump uncovered in our friends' yard where they are opening up a cave:

This is my cousin Tom and his sister's youngest, Lilly:

My mom and sister make amazing breakfasts sometimes. For example: poached egg on a garden tomato, grits, and waffles from scratch with homemade blueberry syrup:

David's completely adorable nephew Joseph, lying on the floor for no apparent reason:

Beautiful garden tomatoes and basil from, I think, my aunt Beauchamp:

My wonderful parents

Wild concord grapes growing at White Stone, Va

House sitting horses and a goat named Princess with Kelly

The best boyfriend I have ever seen in real life, snuggling with an extremely loving and energetic three-legged dog named June:

Edit/recap of things tonight, in bullet form, plus an edit, not in bullet form:

we visited my aunt at the river, and kyaked, and road around the bay in a skiff, and picked wild grapes as we watched the sun set from the beach.

as a result of complaining that none of the houses at the river will ever belong to me, I got invited to an island in s.c. for a weekend. evidently I am stupidly lucky today.

my mom fell asleep in the living room, and my dad in their bedroom (I am back at my parents' house. man I'm cool.)--so I'm hearing the snores in stereo. kind of cool.

I finished book 10 of the Wheel of Time series. this, for those of you who don't know, is an extremely long and involved fantasy series. all of the books are around a thousand pages long. did I mention how I was cool?

also, my cousin holly asked me when I was getting engaged, and the question didn't even really freak me out or particularly irritate me. as a result of this, I am now freaked out.


one more thing: I just found this post on opendiary about the anniversary of Katrina in New Orleans. it's really good. now I want to go to nawlins and help however I can. thinking that, my automatic reaction (never fails) is, "they probably don't still need help," or, "what could I do, anyway?" or, "I wouldn't even know where to start." any excuse to stay at home and do absolutely nothing. but my mid-summer resolution has been to start doing things. to start taking risks and stop sitting at home and whining about how I used to waste so many opportunities. I don't know if I'll end up in new orleans anytime soon, but I've got to stop making excuses.

I know that anyone reading that is probably thinking, "yeah, right. tomorrow." but I really have made some progress here. specifically, I have been looking into/applying to work teaching esl in south korea, and I'm trying to actually listen when people suggest things to me. it's like my own personal little version of "yes man*."





*which I have never seen.

Gee, what a grape time.

My father's family has some pieces of land, all close together or right up next to each other, in White Stone, Va. Actually, unfortunately, it's not really my father's family--it's the family of my father's ex-sister-in-law. Apparently they are distant cousins, several generations back, but I'm pretty sure that's not enough of a blood connection for me to have a shot at ever living at Mosquito Point. Maybe if I beg I'll be able to have my wedding there someday, but I think that might be all I can hope for.

Anyway, my parents and my sister and I went out there for the day to visit said former aunt of mine (though "former," we still address her as an aunt, and always will) at her little cottage by the river and have dinner. It was beautiful. Her daughter/my cousin and her husband and kids were out there, though staying in another house, so we saw them for a little while. Mom and Chloe (sister) and I went kyaking, and then all of us went for a ride in a skiff that my cousin Holly and her husband are thinking of buying from one of the many members of this sprawling family that I don't really know. Sweetheart's husband, I think. I guess I've probably met Sweetheart at some point, but I don't remember it.

Back to topic, which was the awesomeness of Mosquito Point. I know it's a terrible name, but the mosquitoes are really less of a problem there than they are at my parents' house. It was just nice to see my aunt and cousins, to spend time on the water, and everything. Actually the ride in the skiff was really awesome, because my dad got to come. He's in a wheelchair and can't really use his hands or legs, so there are a lot of things he can't be a part of, but Brian and a friend of his that was there (also named Brian, actually) lifted him down into the boat and found a way to keep him in a seat without him falling out. He said he hadn't been in a boat like that in 40 years.

After boating we, thoroughly soaked, went back to my aunt's house and watched the sun set from the little strip of beach down the hill. I was shocked and pretty excited to find out that there were wild concord grapes (because I've never picked grapes, wild or otherwise) growing all along the beach. We picked a little bag of them, and my mom wants to make jam. Unfortunately, though the discovery was exciting, apparently I don't really like wild concord grapes. They were beautiful anyway.