Mockingbird Hill Cottage

Mockingbird Hill Cottage

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It Sure Feels Like Autumn

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I love those rare mornings when you can still see the moon in the sky at 10 am. That’s what we saw this morning. It may not be fall officially, but it sure is around here. The mornings are cool and crisp, leaves are constantly floating to the ground, trees are turning color, and the garden beds are full of leaves and cobwebs.

On this sunny day, it made for a lovely morning walk. It’s going to get warmer this weekend, with temperatures in the mid-eighties. The last hurrah?

I read a lot yesterday and I’m just about to finish The Woman in the Window. I must say, it’s well done, with lots of twists and turns in the plot. It has a Rear Window – type premise, which allows for all sorts of thrills.

Monarchs have started migrating south, but this guy won’t be migrating for a while. We saw him on one of the milkweed plants this morning, chomping away on a leaf. I’ve seen more monarch caterpillars this year than ever before.

I’m missing some of the birds that were here all summer long  – I think robins have already headed south – but I saw a goldfinch drinking from the birdbath yesterday, and a catbird calling from the porch railing. We also saw (and heard) Canada Geese this morning, flying in beautiful formation.

It’s a lovely day today.

Happy Wednesday.

Sleep (Or Lack Thereof) and Books

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Tuesday in the Hudson Valley. A sunny day, no rain, temps in the seventies.

I can’t complain.

Oh lord, did I have a weird night last night. It was one of those nights where I wasn’t sure if I was sleeping or not. Have you ever had one of those? It seems like you’re in some in-between state; not sleeping and not awake. I do know that I feel very tired this morning, so I can’t have slept all that much. This happens rarely, thank goodness, but its a surreal experience. I finally gave up and got out of bed at 5:30, which threw off Don’s morning rhythm. He’s usually up before me, but this time I trailed him downstairs.

Funny how we have our daily rhythms. Don is up for at least an hour before me, usually, and by the time I get up, he’s read for an hour, had his coffee, and upon hearing me come downstairs, proceeds to make mine. I have my rhythms as well, and you’ll sometimes hear one of us saying to the other, “You realize you’re throwing my rhythm off, don’t you?”  Or, when the day requires an early trip into Manhattan, for example, we’ll comment that the whole day’s rhythm has been thrown off.

That happens to everyone, but maybe even more so as you get older and have more time on your hands. There was a time when my days were incapable of having a rhythm because my schedule changed so much from day to day and I just went with it.

But now I’m older and, boy, do I love the pattern and structure of my days. So does Don.

I happened to glance up yesterday and saw these little dots of light (from the blinds) all over the den. Sort of magical!

I’ve started a new book, The Woman in the Window  by A. J. Finn. It’s a mystery that I’ve had on my shelf for well over a year. So far it’s quite good and I’m intrigued. I finished The Feral Detective  by Jonathan Lethem this morning. It was one of the books I picked up at Oblong Books last week. Excellent read; very modern, post-2016 election (with references to the shock and unreality of that day), edgy, and surreal. It’s a mystery. I liked it very much. It’s also interesting to see That Man referred to in a work of fiction. But then again, he deals in fiction, so I guess it’s appropriate.

I plan to lay low (not enough sleep) and read.

That’s it. That’s my plan for the day.

Happy Tuesday.

On Books and Acting and Aging Flowers

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The changing texture of flowers that are going to seed fascinates me. I could spend hours photographing them. There’s something noble and majestic about them.

It’s Saturday. Don is out mowing the lawn and I will join him after I write this post. It’s supposed to rain later in the day, so we’re trying to tackle the longest parts of the lawn today and we’ll get to the rest next week, when it promises to be rainless.

I finished The Book of Bones  yesterday. And then I moved on to a short novella by Alan Bennett titled, The Uncommon Reader, which I got from the library. Bennett is brilliant and this little gem centers on the Queen of England, with Bennett imagining what would happen if the Queen suddenly discovered the world of books and reading. How would that impact her schedule? How would her equerries and aides handle her newfound passion? What about the Duke of Edinburgh? It’s positively charming and delightful and only 117 pages long, so I read it in its entirely this morning. Bennett wrote it about 10 years ago and I recommend it highly.

Now what? I’m not sure. I’ve got a couple of ideas in mind.

We’re watching a three-part series that originally aired here on PBS, called The Worricker Trilogy. We’re big fans of the actor Bill Nighy and we discovered it while searching on Amazon Prime for anything that featured him. The trilogy is excellent. We’ll watch the third installment tonight. Nighy is such a wonderful actor, honest, real and spare in his performance. I admire this kind of acting more and more, as does Don. It isn’t about “Look at me and all my histrionics, aren’t I talented?” but rather about the role itself and being true to the text. That takes a supremely confident actor who is not caught up in his ego. Nighy is that kind of actor. So is Helena Bonham Carter, who is a costar in the second installment. Too many actors want to show you all they can do and that, my friends, is either ego run amok or simple insecurity. To just live in the role, to simply inhabit it – especially on film – is the best kind of acting.

Ah well. I must go and help my husband mow. Duty calls!

Happy Saturday.

 

 

Lambs Like to Party

Lambs Like to Party

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