A Lovely Monday.

This morning was magical. The weather was perfect--cool enough outside that the blanket on my bed was just right. KidThree had a dentist appointment at ten, so we got to sleep in a little bit instead of getting up to go to school. I lay in bed listening to the morning traffic go by outside the window, gloating inside, "I'm in bed and you're not!" Then I got up and checked email and read the news on the computer. An item caught my eye about a lumber truck spilling its entire load and closing a freeway, but I didn't read the article as I'm no longer a commuter. I woke up KidThree to get ready for her appointment, then realized the closed freeway might get in the way of our trip to the dentist. I got back on the computer to read the actual article and, sure enough, the spill was just past where we would have gotten off that freeway, with the back-up miles long, right on our route. So, no trip to the dentist. I called the office to tell them we couldn't make it because of the freeway closure, then looked around here to see what I could get done with the free morning.

KidThree's room was it. Yesterday turned out to be busier than I expected with homework and such, so I hadn't gotten much done in there. This morning, though, I was all business. The entire closet is now a masterpiece of organization. In fact, I hijacked KidThree on her way to clean her teeth and made her admire it, prompting her, "now isn't that a masterpiece of organization?" She agreed that it was, indeed, a masterpiece of organization. Seriously, it looks good. All her medical supplies are put away, the extra bookcase from the living room is in there (it used to have The Frogs' tank on it), a cabinet for her miscellaneous things is in there, and all her hanging clothes are put away. It may not sound like much, but that was a job that needed doing. Then I got her bureaus moved to where they need to be, and re-did the drawers while I was at it. The room isn't finished--it still has my futon and an odd cabinet or two taking up floor space--but it is well on the way to finished and functional for KidThree.

I do so crave organization. Felix Unger I'm not, but more than minor disorder hurts my soul. It makes me feel constricted and trapped and non-functional. Order is good. It is good to have homes for things, and things in those homes. It is wonderful to need something and know immediately where it is, because it has a place and is in that place. I haven't gotten to that point yet in this apartment because of the combination of the influx of bodies and the slow learning curve related to learning how to manage accessibility. Now, though, extraneous bodies are gone, their associated possessions and critters are gone, and KidThree has been in the chair long enough that I am practiced at figuring out how to arrange things so that she has maximum access. We are close enough to Complete Orderliness that I can taste it.

This afternoon I stayed with LadyP for several hours. This was one of her good days, where she could expand on one of her usual memories, adding details that are usually missing. There were several catalogs on a counter; we had a good time going through them, deciding which items we liked and which we didn't. Good girl-talk stuff. I have a mail-order jewelry catalog in the recycling that I'll fish out and take to LadyP's on my Thursday visit. She'll like going through that one. I'll bring a couple of simple jigsaw puzzles, too; she likes those.

Update on my "Don't Block the Walk" column that appeared in our local paper last Thursday: Today, when taking KidThree to school, we passed a corner where the homeowner has an absolutely beautiful growth of morning glories along the edge of his property, morning glories that unfortunately have run across the sidewalk almost to the curb. The sidewalk there has been impassable because of the wild growth. Today, however, the morning glories were cut back to the edge of the property, leaving the sidewalk clear. It looked like the work was just done this morning, as the sidewalk did have a bit of debris on it and the piles of trimmings were still right there in the street. It might be just a coincidence, but, what the heck, I'm giving my column the credit. And just before sitting down to write this blog entry, I sent off a letter to the editor to tell that homeowner thank you.

That is it for today. Homework help is now 'In.'

A