In My Own Mind

9 a.m. Dearest, I am sitting on a porch overlooking the creek - the other side of the creek this time. I've come along with D on a job - I felt that I just couldn't bear to be by myself this Sunday morning - never alone on Sunday, as Lyle Lovett sings. It is lovely to sit perched here on the porch high on a hill looking down at the shimmering water. The water is audible, a constant backdrop of sound, like a waterfall. Maybe there is a waterfall. There is bird song, and the sound of the back door opening and slapping shut as the men go about the house in circles (or so it seems at the moment) going about their work. It's another one of those grey misty days reminding me of camping trips - another reason, I think, that I came along for the ride. The scenery is reminiscent of Mianus or Aspetuck or Webetuck or wherever it was we girl scouts used to go by VW bus to camp. (I look around - tangle of trees, bare branches like pincers. Chill mists cut through me and I see my breath, then the sun comes out and I'm warm.)

I just walked down the road to the water's edge - it's shallow rapids that I hear. I wonder if anyone ever swims here (in the quieter parts), how deep the water is. Maybe it's too treacherous for swimming. For rafting? I've never seen anyone on the water.

I feel like Cunegonde being here. Perhaps I should be making pastries to help, I said to the client (nice guy). I brought cookies yesterday - close! (Endless recursions - I am Echo and Cunegonde). Making lunch would be more realistic and practical, though. It would be nice to make them lunch, cook something up this morning. Spaghetti sauce, perhaps. Or perhaps just sandwiches. I ask myself - what would Ruth Reichl do?

***
1 p.m. As it happened the client wanted Subway for lunch and D & I went home for leftovers. It wasn't my Cunegonde day today, though I sent D back with more cookies. Am at the library now, will head back to sit on the Adirondack chair on the client's porch again. It is good to tear myself away from the computer and from KZE for a day. As a result I have made great progress with Jerome Charyn's Emily Dickinson novel. I'm very impressed with it, bracing language and voice. I glance at reviews on the dust jacket - someone compares Charyn to Nabokov, and I think that's about right - it's that startlingly direct, fresh and original.

Wondering about mysterious page hits from Belgium - so strange, this page hit business, and none, ever, from Hudson. Go figure. Anyway. Hope your Sunday is going well, darling. Thinking of you. Kisses.