matching tracksuits

Our neighbors, it turns out, still have the same neighbors that foraged in our trash a few years ago and seemed able to get into our compost no matter now cleverly I thought I’d secured it. They were a bit shy at first. Indeed, they were so shy to begin with that I didn’t even realize they were “they.”

But with enough patience, sitting facing the neighbors’ tree while the boy played,

they began coming down the tree. At first, I only saw the parent and one baby. It wasn’t until I looked closely at the pictures this evening that I realized how much we have in common: a couple of kids, an old house, and rings around our eyes.

They shyness continued, with one peaking out for a last glimpse of that strange creature with the odd black appendage that it keeps pointing toward us.

By then, K and L had returned from the pre-recital ballet pictures and the four of us headed out for a walk, dropping the girl off at her friend’s house up the street.

Such an odd little neighborhood. Most houses date from the late sixties, giving them either look of a tired maturity or experienced elegance, depending on the time the owners put into the upkeep. But sprinkled in and about them are newer houses, some obviously less than ten or fifteen years old.

And then there are the mysteries, like the neighbors who obviously spent several thousand dollars cutting down more than ten large trees in their yard while their house has signs of neglect creeping around the doors and windows.

“If I had a few grand to spend on the house,” I laughed, “the last thing I’d spend it on would be the removal of trees.” Of course the large oak with the hollow, rotten core would have been a different story. Still, first on my list of priorities is our tired, tired kitchen, in need of a complete overhaul. A finished laundry room would be a pleasant addition, as would a remodeled guest bath. Cutting down a few trees in the backyard — what’s the point?

But about this time,  the Boy began reminding us how late it had grown, so we returned to our house with the temporarily fabulous front lawn, the ever-tired kitchen, the unfinished laundry, and the beds.

Saturday morning, blue sky, cup of coffee, 10-20mm wide-angle lens on the back deck. A day like this calls for outside work: the three unfinished Leyland cypresses do too.

Then again, the Boy looks spectacular, and I consider taking him out to hit the links, only to remember that I don’t play golf.

Nor do I play tennis. My tennis racket has been pressed into carpenter-bee-launching duty and the only tennis balls I have are on the bottoms of the legs of the thirty-odd desks in my classroom.

Such a beautiful day, though. It calls for time outside. It calls for walks. It calls for coffee on the back porch.

What such a start doesn’t call for is time spent waiting for someone to rotate my tires only to leave just as they pull my little Jetta into to garage, but that’s just what happens. And that’s okay. Not at first, but eventually — wasted time is lost time, and it irritates me.

Still, the trees are patient.

By the time I get back to the deck again to take the “after” shot, it’s past nine. Dark, quiet, still. The kids are in bed; the day is over — only one thing remaining: document the day.

And then I discover 147Trance’s YouTube channel, and before I know it, it’s past midnight. Technically, I skipped a day. Well, somewhere it’s still the twenty-fifth…