1. Gratitude for the 24-hour grocery store. You can tell a lot about a person's week based on their trash. Today is trash day and I'm out before the recycling truck and so I can see the cans overflowing with pizza boxes and TV boxes and air filters. We make more trash in this house than we did in the last one and I'm not entirely sure how or why but I want to change that.

2. The way the light of the morning is falling onto my desk. I should capture this. The beginnings of the day. The one thing about not posting on Instagram is that my camera is not in my hand. We need to become familiar again.

3. The spiderwebs are getting bigger.

4. I will wash the walls and the doors and the baseboards today so that I can paint on Friday. That's the thing about white walls: they show all the evidence of the living.

5. Nothing I am doing is working right. I think it's all in my head. 

6. The little one and I go for a ride. Now that he's on two wheels, the world feels so different. As sad as I am that he won't hold my hand in public anymore, I love moments like these where he and I can do things that excite him. Plus I just needed the fresh air.

7. I find a few books in the library but none are exactly what I was looking for. The selection always feels so limited. I can get almost anything digitally but I want a real book. I like to flip pages and feel the texture on my fingertips. Reading is such a sensual experience.

8. I try to work on the computer outside but the between the glare and the loud talking by the landscapers a few houses down, I decide to call it quits and fold laundry. 

9. I realize that I've been stewing in shame and guilt and fear for the whole day and this is why everything I've touched is paled over. So I go back to the journal and write while I stir the risotto, circle back to my why, write my gratitude in all caps. 

10. The garden is wild. All the tomato plants are now fruiting, there is so much basil and sage and thyme. The okra is beginning to flower. There are two large green bell peppers and the watermelon wants to creep up the side of the house. I like this. I like this a lot.