When I was a little girl, I used to carry a blanket and a book out to our pasture. I'd stomp around the tall grass until I'd find a patch that had been burrowed out by a rabbit or something and I'd lay my blanket down and crawl into the shelter of the tall grass. I'd spend all day out there reading. Sometimes I'd take a kite. I'd fly the kite out as far as I had string. Then I would lay back and just watch the kite, occasionally giving the string a tug to keep it up or zig one way or another. There were times I'd watch that kite and it would be so high up in the sky that I thought for sure a plane would pass by and take it out. I'd watch the clouds float by and find the shapes. I might even take a little nap or just listen to the loud buggy sounds of summer. And that's where I'd stay until someone would holler out the back door for me to come in for dinner. Today I cleaned the bathroom and kitchen. I hung the clothes on the line to dry. I replaced the spark plug on the mower and mowed my front yard (back yard was still too soggy in places). I showered and ate a snack, took down a load of clothes and put the last load of clothes on the line. And then, I grabbed a blanket and my book, coated myself in sunscreen and found a dry patch of ground. And while clothes dried on the line, fluttering in the breeze, I read. I watched big puffy clouds float by and found the shapes. I listened to tree leaves rustling in the wind. I heard a little woodpecker tapping at a tree and I watched a robin snag a worm.

It seems like it's been years since I've done that. If I'm outside these days it's to do yard work and ride the scooter around town or hang out with friends in their backyards. I've never taken the time to just be still in my own backyard. I have no idea why that is. The weather here has been so strange. It's just now getting warm and we've had so much rain. It seems like on those days where I'm free to lay about in the backyard are days where the weather has decided to drop buckets of water. It rained here again last night and gave me a little anxiety about getting my yard mowed so I wouldn't be that house on the street. But even though the backyard didn't get a chance to dry out (it's flat, front yard not flat at all), the sun came out and it was perfection.

Hope your day was just as nice.