Spring Cleaning

Holy Moses it's been hard to blog lately. (I'm trying to get away from saying "Jesus Christ!" all the time as an exclamation...as a good Jewish girl it's surprising how often I reference the guy.) And as usual it's because there's lots going on, and lots of big wannabe blog post ideas are gumming up the oh so delicate brainworks. So to get around that I'm just going to do a little brain dump--one could rightly call it a bit of spring cleaning, or at least cleaning in honor of spring--because that's better than nothing.

So speaking of spring, said season has sprung here in a major way. It feels like it came especially early this year--early to mid February rather than early March. Global warming? This year's particular unique weather pattern? Who knows. The fuzzy yellow acacias have come and are nearly gone (they seem to have had a somewhat shorter season this year, blooming later than their usual mid January and petering out now that we're into March). But the cherished (by me) and oh-so brief pink and green season is in full swing. Pink for the magnolias and cherry trees--god I love those flowers--and green for the succulent grass turning the hills and roadsides a vibrant emerald. The daffodils are blooming in yards and medians, the air is mild and fragrant, the buds are about to burst into leaves on all the naked trees. I am giddy with enjoyment of all the pink and green, and already mourning (yes, in advance) the loss of the flowers as they slowly transmute into leaves. I want to get out there and take pictures of everything just so I have something to remember it all by.

Other things are feeling fresh and showing signs of rebirth too. I've been getting a lot more done on the novel, for example--never as much or as fast as I'd like, but more: two more chapters and a bunch of continuity edits on previously written chapters. Now I'm paused while I figure out some complicated worldbuilding issues, but I'm not discouraged, just doing the necessary background work. (Later I'll have some plot issues to refine, and that's much more likely to be discouraging. But I will continue to slog.)

Things are growing and changing with the kids, too--especially Isaac. Just in time for his birthday next week, he is becoming your classic tantrum-prone, "me do it!" two year old. But along with the insistence that it is his god-given right to control every situation and person around him comes an incredible flowering of his power to communicate--speech has suddenly become something he can *do*, not just hear. It's a contradictory, crazy-making age of opposites: on the one hand, this truly is the age where a kid's unreasonable and unceasing whining and crying can grate every last nerve down to the nub so badly that you just want to lock yourself in the bathroom and drown yourself in the bathtub (not that I ever feel that way, oh no), but it's also the most breathtakingly enthusiastic and deliciously adorable age of all--so it kind of equals out in the long run.

Ok, I know there's more to clean out of my musty brain, but this will have to be it for now. The Lord and Lady of Dreams are having a little intimate dinner party tonight and I don't want to miss the soup course.