This is what I see when I look out the window of my writing loft. Green native grasses, a pine-covered ridge to the south, and five miles beyond (not visible from here), Hermit's Peak, where in the 1870s a real hermit, Giovanni Augustiani, lived for several years in a rock shelter. This is the summer monsoon season, and Bill (who is repairing and refinishing the logs of our house) is endlessly frustrated by the rains. I'm sorry for his frustration, but I love the rain, and the delightfully varied weathers: bright, clear mornings; billowing thunderheads and curtains of rain falling across the mountains in the afternoon; brilliant sunsets; starry, starry nights.
Yesterday, we visited a neighbor's garden. Marge and Dick are growing carrots, beets, beans, lettuces, potatoes, tomatoes, strawberries, corn, and peas in a deer-proof enclosure. (We brought home a bag of fresh peas. I shelled them and we had them for supper--delicious.) The growing season here is short: last frost the second week of June, first frost the middle of September. Last year, Marge brought in her green tomatoes and ripened them in the basement. On Saturday, we went to a farmer's market in Las Vegas: watermelons, cantalopes, squash, peas, and bushels of fresh corn. The Mora Valley, just to the north of us, has long been known for its truck gardening. We're planning a few more day trips, after the book is finished. Not sure how long I'll be here--maybe a couple more weeks.
Book report. The book will be finished today, maybe, or tomorrow. It's actually done--that is, it's all written. This is my last pass through it, cleaning up problems, smoothing the style, reweaving a few plot strands. The work has gone pretty fast, and I'm pleased. I gave a book talk on Saturday night at Tome on the Range, to a full house. It's not every town (Las Vegas is only about 15,000) that has an independent bookstore, thanks to the commitment and courage of Nancy (the owner) and Janet (the manager). Life isn't easy for non-chain bookstores these days, and these gals deserve a huge round of applause.
Otherwise, reading (currently High Noon for Natural Gas: The New Energy Crisis--part of my effort to educate myself to the various resource depletions we are facing); knitting a sock; watching DVDs in the evening (last night, the old but still good Conduct Unbecoming). We're slowly getting used to life without Labs, and Toro is settling into his new status as Only Dog. We had a birthday party for neighbor Bob Goodfellow (his 73rd!), but Toro stole the show from Bob. He was the center of attention and loved it.
Reading note, from Little Things in a Big Country, one of the books for the online class I'm teaching for Story Circle this fall: And what do we really know of all this--the substance of light, the inner lives of creatures, the forming and dissolving of clouds and mountains, the countless events playing out simultaneously, ceaselessly? I find it soothing to be rendered insignificant. And am cheered just to be at home on the planet, upright and walking around, in the midst of the vast unknowable.--Hannah Hinchman