My husband just came back from his morning walk and presented me with this:

That’s a nice way to start a cold and rainy day!

Yesterday, on the other hand, was simply beautiful. It was sunny and warm and we worked outside for a quite a while; Don mowing the front lawn, me cleaning the porch and filling my planters with pansies. There’s still a lot of work to be done on the porch, but doing even the little I did yesterday was so good for my soul. I actually felt the warmth of the sun on my face. Heaven.

All four of these planters have been filled with big, fat pansies, as well as the window box planter that I lives on the porch railing. The hanging plants have been put in place. I started to sweep sections of the porch and I hauled all of my pots out of the shed. And – finally – the snow shovels were retired until next winter. We sat on the Funky Patio and watched Mr. and Mrs. Nuthatch fly in and out of the bush. I can’t tell whether they have babies yet or if they’re still in planning mode. Periodically one would fly into the opening of the branch. One of them kept pecking at another section of the branch. Were they getting food for babies? Were they adding to the nest materials? We don’t know. I couldn’t hear any tiny chirps when I got close. But mostly, we tried to stay away and watch from a distance. They fly right by our heads, so they don’t seem to be shy or disturbed by our presence.

Don named them Ozzie and Harriet.

We haven’t seen Henry yet this year and like every year at this time, I worry that he might have passed away. We’ve seen the groundhog that lives next door, but not Henry. Hopefully, this will be temporary and I’ll see him sunning himself on the ramp to the shed. We’ve been calling to him, telling him we miss him.

We had some excitement the other day. I heard a loud sound and voices shouting and I went out on the porch to see what was happening. A large rental truck had somehow crashed and flipped on its side just down the road from us. When I reached the end of our driveway, I saw several people removing cargo from the truck. It didn’t seem as if anyone was hurt and about 8 rescue vehicles arrived shortly after that. The ambulance and fire rescue trucks were the first to leave, and not with sirens wailing, so nobody was hurt. My neighbors all made an appearance on their driveways. After a long winter coupled with social distancing, I got to see everyone, however briefly. There were vehicles out there well into the evening as they had to get the truck onto a trailer and that was a big job.

Today, we’re inside because of the rain. I just may start the Hardy Boys puzzle. I was going to wait for my other puzzles to arrive, but one of them won’t be shipped for another week and the one that has been shipped won’t be here until Thursday. I don’t think I can wait that long.

By the way, to clarify – I didn’t have a full-out panic attack the other day. I felt heightened anxiety, something I’ve begun to experience for the first time in my life this past year. My mom went through a period of having panic attacks. This thing I’m coping with on occasion is unsettling and uncomfortable and I don’t like it, but it’s not nearly what my mom went through. I suppose anxiety and panic attacks take differing forms and everyone’s experience varies.

Stay safe.

Happy Sunday.