The treehouse DebbieR referred to. Photos here.

Four stories high, now with an elevator and building-code compliant.

I think if you ever had to cut down one of those trees that it’s no longer dependent on you’d have to do it really really carefully. But what a cool house!

A potluck picnic at the pool, old friends gathered, stories swapped.

I finally got to hear the rest of the story of the duck. The infamous huge duck. That actually once got a swim in the Baylands preserve. But mostly it was right by the side of the main commuter artery into downtown.

The artist who made it from scraps of metal and who knows what all else got harassed by the city over it and finally offered it to one of his co-workers from his day job (this guy) who appreciated such fine, fine craftsmanship.

The new owner’s kids liked to take turns camping in it.

A woman pushing a stroller stopped my friend and said she’d just moved here and her husband had bought the house without her even getting to see it first and she didn’t want to live in that town with the snooty reputation and he’d assured her, It’s okay. There’s a duck down the street. So she was looking for the duck.

Karen just so happened to know exactly where that was. (Here, let me show you the other side of my yard…) The woman went away much cheered. Quirks are fun. Good neighbors are the best. Two-for-one.

Then the particular city official whose position shall not be named here went after them because he really did not like that duck and thought it a blight on the community and dammit that thing was still around after all. Karen described it as “the size of a Volkswagon bug” and she was not wrong. Did I mention it was bright medium blue? You couldn’t miss it.

The judge was appalled: You’re bringing a case against these people? Over a LAWN ORNAMENT? Don’t you ever harass them nor waste this court’s time over such nonsense again!

The family had their seventh child and wanted to put a second story on their house. They needed those extra bedrooms.

That guy again. He told them You will NEVER get a building permit, and then he made good on that threat–until eventually he was fired. They built their second story.

So what happened to the duck? I asked. I used to drive by it all the time and it was one of those little perks of living here, everybody in the city knew that thing.

One of her kids had knocked its head off when no one was looking because he wanted his own bedroom and he was afraid someday he might have to sleep outside inside the duck like his big brother liked to do but that did not do it for him.

But that duck had adventures: permits were issued, it was hauled to the main drag on a trailer to celebrate a Stanford game, it was stolen by the rival high school who did not have a trailer nor permit and they bashed it in a bit in the process but it was gotten back.

So where is it now? I asked. I haven’t seen it in years.

Oh, I’ve still got the head, she said.

I can just hear it: Kids! Didn’t I tell you not to slam the door!

I just hope when they were building this place that the contractors didn’t put all the boxes of things for the bathrooms in one place as they worked on other rooms.

Because you know what they say: people in glass houses shouldn’t stow thrones.

I love my stoneware from Mel and Kris. But I also use small white Corningware plates all the time for all the little things. Good for carrying peach pits to the compost bin and all that.

No matter that they’re never loaded to touch anything in the dishwasher, sometimes an old one will come out with a tiny chip or round divot, which is a good time to let them retire.

I was unloading the machine this morning when suddenly there was this tiny emphatic stabbing of broken glass. Too tiny to see but wow did that thing have a bite to it, there was no question what that was.

I had one of those rare flashes of brilliance: I stepped around the corner to where the heavy-duty clear shipping tape was. I cut off a small piece, wrapped it around my finger and kind of kneaded it just for good measure, hoping I wasn’t pushing the thing further in.

Then I held the tape up to the skylight.

There it was. A round speck possibly smaller than the period at the end of this sentence. There was a tiny drop of blood on my finger, a few minutes more of ouchie while my finger whined at me, and then that was that. It was gone.

So I thought I’d mention it in case anyone else ever needs to know.

Scene: Church. Russ speaking.

Of the purpose of our gathering together: Of learning to serve one another and love one another, fully, completely, as we are Loved, every one of us.

One young dad when it was his turn spoke of the joy of waiting for their firstborn last month, of finally getting to meet her–and of his forever gratefulness for the prayers sent her way as she spent a week in the NICU fighting for her life.

His new daughter is safe and sound and home now. It doesn’t turn out that way for everyone, he said, and he knew that, and he knew he didn’t understand why that was so and he was all the more grateful that for them it got to turn out how they had so hoped.

What he didn’t know yet but I do is that that will see him through so many moments to come of her growing up: this is the child they almost lost. This is the child that G_d meant to have be here, after everything her birth could throw at her, and she is alright. She will be all right. No matter the individual moments along the way.

Teenagerhood ain’t got nuthin’ on the memories held by a parent who nearly lost that child. Gratitude rules.

The thrill of being able to do laundry again does lose a little bit after the twelfth straight hour of it, and tomorrow looks to be the same; the towels have to be clean before you can use them to clean. And there was half a closetful of wet clothes to deal with–long way to go there–as well as catching up on the normal day-to-day.

But every time I walk in and see that new machine it does still feel gratifying to be able to.

I did get a wow and a laugh: he knew the guy who became, it turns out, the owner of this house. We’d always wondered how things had turned out for him.

I puzzled and puzzled and cannot tell from the pictures how the twists in the stairs end in doors that open, but then, for us, we chose for them not to.

At 4:29 he said he was on his way. Yay!

He had me flushing toilets so many times each, stopping when the shower pans started to fill up again, waiting, then doing it again only more and turning on the shower once he got the roots cut to help wash it all out. He was on the roof, I was inside and occasionally running outside for further instructions, phone captions at the ready. There is a reason I put on a skirt with deep pockets this morning.

A little after 6 he was on his way home towards dinner with one of the last of our peaches.

The first dishwasher load is done.

The second laundry load is about to go in the dryer–having warmed clothes is such a novelty–and I will be doing towels and towels and towels tomorrow. They’ve been laying out playing beach bum in the sun and who knew we had so many that were burgundy?

I wonder what the plane passengers have been thinking as they look down near the airport.

I learned the hard way that it’s worth waiting for Lee; last time I thought I couldn’t wait the extra day, I ended up with a kitchen sink that left the living room rug squishy with water for our $800+. It took it a few days to collect that much under the foundation to the point that we could notice it.

When Lee later came to rescue us from that, he saw what the guy had done and told me that that was an under five minute job with a twenty dollar part and warned me about the new ownership of that company.

So this time I waited.

Turns out he was waiting for a delayed flight home with doctor appointments lined up for the week, but he highly recommended his friend who used to work for him.

So I called that guy. He was going to come around 5–but things were taking too long and he called back this afternoon very apologetically; would tomorrow at 5 be okay?

Let’s see, take my chance on some random guy off the internet again or stick with the honest ones who know their job and answer to each other on it and stand by their work.

Good thing I ran four laundry loads after the dryer guys left Saturday.

Which is surely why the slowing system belched Sunday, but hey, we’ll get it back to normal with his help.

No one was doing anything with water this afternoon when he heard the big gurgle sound and hurried to check it out.

The tub was filling with water. The bathroom floors were in Deep Splash mode and flowing out the doors, with ours flowing under our closet and soaking any clothes that touched clothes that touched the floor, and I am married to a tall man. I instantly knew what a huge job this was all about to be.

But everything had been fine a half hour earlier!

And if you mop it up with towels–I had this moment of oh I’m so glad we got that dryer in time! immediately followed by, wait… Water was pouring out of the laundry room too. With no machine in use all day.

At least it was clear. It was clear it was clear it was clear. Not that I’d trust it for that but at least it felt better.

Shortly after, a friend drove up with his shop vac as I was twisting out towels out front and told him I was watering the azaleas.

Dave pitched right in. We sent him home with Andy’s peaches and a pound of dried apricot slabs and he asked about how to take care of the apricot tree we gave him a few months ago; I showed him mine so he could see what his would look like at a year older, and at the difference in growth since he’d picked up his.

This city owns its own utilities and they answer to the voters, which I love because it means their emergency guy came out within minutes to check the city’s line to the house. He was actually apologetic that the problem wasn’t there so he couldn’t do anything about it; we sent him off with thanks and a peach.

We sent yesterday’s installers home with a small box of peaches each.

We’re hoping our favorite plumber can make it tomorrow.

And after that I’m going to have to go back and pick up more peaches at Andy’s because we’re going through them pretty fast.

Okay, it looked like we were back up, I tried to post, and everything went poof. As Richard put it, The blog was well and truly hacked.

Let’s see if I can retrieve it… There it is! And yay again for the resident geek! But my preview is gone and it’s late at this point and you’ll just have to take it with no editing work.

—

And the blog is back up! Yay for the resident geek!

After ten long months of hanging things to dry in the kids’ old bathroom overnight, with family coming soon that just wasn’t going to work anymore. Did Speed Queen owe me a working dryer under the warranty? Yes they did. Would they do it? No they refused. Did the seller go to bat for me with them? No. Speed Queen would only repair the old one, telling me they never replace, and the repairman said that that was a risk he wasn’t willing to take because the board sparking meant it was too much of a fire hazard. Nearly burning the house down once was enough.

He was clearly afraid I would sue them and he would be dragged into it and he was done with it. He wouldn’t come and they wouldn’t give. And so I got nowhere.

I fantasized about returning it to the seller’s doorstep but didn’t want to be charged with dumping.

I can now no longer prove to Speed Queen that their machine is as the guy told me: it is gone. The new one via Costco is a Frigidaire with good reviews and the delivery men were the best.

Two things I learned: companies seem to be cutting costs by getting rid of the interior light and by curving the top of the back dashboard inward at the sides so they can use less metal. Many reviews complained about clothes falling down behind in the gaps that created.

The Frigidaire is much closer to straight up and it has an interior light and it’s a classic front-entry like I wanted and by golly it works, it works and that’s all I ever wanted in a dryer. It cost about half what my Speed Queen did. Warm clothes that are softened in the process! No more burlap towels!

So: I opened the door to the delivery guy with the greeting, My hero! And explained it had been ten months without one. He laughed. 

There were two of them and they each got sent off with a box of peaches from Andy’s bought yesterday and napkins they were going to need for them. It was 4:30, they’d been working since 6 a.m., they were tired, but they both perked up at those peaches, more so than the tip.

The inaugural load has begun. At long, long last.

Oh Birkenstock. Do none of you knit? Do any of you who do knit have a dog or a cat?

Because seriously, the yarn barf shoe, with the strap playing ball band trying to hold it all together, is the funniest thing you’ve ever done.

A hey, how are you. A response of, It’s been too long. A, How about we…

And there we were in an impromptu dinner together after a your house or ours we don’t care we just want to see you guys. Fruit from Andy’s. Her yarn in bins over there so she could choose the colors for the next big project, just like mine are over here at the moment. She pulled out my book and said she was going to knit a shawl for a friend and I pointed out the simplest to do (the Julia) vs the more involved (like the one named after her.) I said doing a three-stitch idiot cord for the neck edge makes a stronger one than what’s in there (hey, you learn something 20 years down the road) and you have the cast-on three, the ones you pick up the stitches along the length of it and then three last ones along the far side. You want a wider edge than I made some of those–start at the count at row 2 on some of those if you need to so it drapes better in the front if it’s for a larger person.

I like doing i-cord, she said, not quite sure what I meant.

Oh right. Idiot cord–it got shortened to i-cord, it’s where the i comes from.

Didn’t know that. Learned something new!

And a great time was had by all, along with a wondering why we don’t do this more often. Maybe we will now.

CVS auto-texted that they had his meds ready to go.

They did not even have one of them on the premises yet, and told me to come back between three and four. And you know that means come at the later end of that. Rush hour. Oh fun.

Four-thirty: the lead pharmacist saw me come back in and went uh oh and directed staff towards opening boxes. One was above waist high. Finally, found it! She apologized that I’d have to wait while she filled the prescription.

No problem. Yay for the chair. I was about to start the decreases on a hat.

Problem: the second circ I’d thrown in was both a size too large and had a gouge in the wood that refused to let stitches move past it. Well that’s a bug.

Got the med finally, got out, decided to stop by Trader Joe’s to get Richard’s favorite mini ice cream cones. Except by then it was after five and the place was jammed.

There was a woman, late 70s? Eighty? She had the biggest scowl on her face and was holding a basket sideways as if to get people out of her way.

There were two young petite Asian women talking and they didn’t notice her fast enough. She rammed them with it and pretended not to have so much as seen them, much less any apology. I was horrified. Yeah, I thought, and I bet I know who you voted for for President, lady.

There was a tall Asian man at the other end of the aisle who saw her do that and was likewise horrified and he was still angry when I tried to smile at him a minute or two later because his baby of about 15 months was adorable.

Understandable.

Where the check out lines form a sort of W near the door, I got the middle line and a dad was close by in the one next to me with his toddler. Out came a finger puppet. Then the tall Asian guy appeared on the other side of me, and he was paying attention to his little one and not being mad anymore. Out came another finger puppet with another “Happy Birthday!” and the little ones could see each other with theirs and this was great.

Then a woman I hadn’t seen previously finally caught up to her husband, pushing a second cart with their older toddler.

She was with the tall Asian guy.

The clerks were slammed, mine was working as fast as she could (really fast, I was impressed) but looked like all she wanted was a place to just sit down and breathe a moment.

I found a little wooly giraffe for the woman’s little girl.

Now we had a club going. The clerk found her second wind, loving this. People farther back in the lines were all smiles. My own day was rescued.

And as the couple walked out the door with me, the woman asked, Did you make them?

I buy them from Peru, I told her. But they are handmade.

Their little girl waved goodbye as we got in our cars. Her mommy and daddy had had her say thank you but she wanted to do it of herself as well.

Summer, college town, new people moving in, always a new medical intern or two. (Being sick at a teaching hospital in July means the new ones haven’t yet had time to get a little experience, but what I saw years ago from the patient side of it is that they are very very earnest about it and trying.)

So: to welcome everybody and help them get to know people, it was announced at church that there would be a picnic in the park next week. Potluck. With a pet parade. There’ll be a softball game that anybody can come and go as they wish, any age; last time, they said, we had a four year old–and Hank!

A bunch of people laughed.

I noticed that some clearly wished they were in on whatever that was all about, so I raised my hand and said, For those who are new: Hank is 95.

A four-year-old playing ball on a great great grandpa’s team: the rest of the room laughed for sheer joy at that mental image.

And, I have no doubt, at being noticed and included, too.

It was a good start.

Clara Parkes on her Substack today asked, if you were to make a sign to welcome people in here, what would it say? A fact? Something humorous? Encouragement, wisdom, suggestions. What would it be?

It took me instantly back to a moment when I was at the point of death and in no way sure which way it would end up. But what I felt!

There was also this: that it was required of me now, that it was more important than there could ever be the words for, that every person I ever encountered after that should feel that, too.

Which was utterly beyond mortal power but I knew in my bones I had to try, while grateful to still be here to give it my best.

So my answer could only be this:

You are loved.