The sun is getting brighter. The morning is cool but that won’t last as it could get into the high 70’s. Everything is wet from the on and off again rain of the last few days. We’re still keeping on eye on Lee. The forecast is for a nor’easter on Saturday, but already the air direction is changing. The morning air is coming through my north facing window. People have started hunkering down. Boats are being taken out of the water. I’m guessing the grocery stores will be filled with harried shoppers. I only need coffee. I ground the last of it yesterday. Coffee is essential.

On my dance card today is the farmer’s market uke concert. I’ll get there early and buy my scones, some native tomatoes and whatever else catches my eye. Last market it was some chocolate chunk candy. I only bought one, a mistake, as it was delicious, even better than a Snickers, a blasphemy.

When I was a kid, my least favorite subject was arithmetic. I remember learning the times tables. I liked only the ones, fives and tens, the easy ones. The nuns kept watch during arithmetic class so I used to hide my fingers under my desk so I could use them for counting. We didn’t have art or music every day, only the basic subjects. I loved reading. Sometimes I’d even hide my book from home inside one of my text books so I could read during class. I never did get caught. My technique was to raise my hand and answer a question or two so it seemed as if I were paying attention.

We always played in the streets. We rode our bikes and roller-skated. We drew hop scotch boxes on the middle of the road. We played Red Light-Green Light, Hide and Seek, Simon Says, regular Tag and Freeze Tag. Not many cars went up or down the street. Most families had only one car, and it was gone all day, driven to work by our dads. We were inside by the time most dads arrived home from work.

I am not a tea drinker, except iced tea. When I was a kid, my mother gave me hot tea when I was sick so I associate tea with being sick. She gave us flat ginger ale and dry toast if our stomachs were upset. They were a mother’s panacea.

I’m watching Snowbeast. It has already done in one skier. Her bloody jacket was found but, no one believes in the creature. It is about to eat victim number two. It roars a lot but no one pays it heed. I guess guileless people are a necessity.

Last night it rained, gently at first then torrentially. I was surrounded by rain. I could hear it pound the windows and the roof. The air was thick and stilled by the humidity. I fell asleep to the rain.

This morning is cloudy and damp. The rain falls intermittently. It is 77°, the high for the day. Tonight will go down to the 60’s. The rest of the week will have similar weather. Hurricane Lee is in the news. Right now, whether it will hit Cape Cod is still uncertain, but we have been warned to expect “dangerous surf and rip currents” beginning Sunday. My mother would say it’s time to batten down the hatches.

My sister Moe was born just before Hurricane Edna wreaked its havoc in 1954. She was small, too small to leave the hospital, so they kept her. It was a good thing as we and thousands of others lost electricity. I remember sitting by the picture window watching the trees being blown. The biggest oak tree fell. It covered the road. We went out with my father during the eye of the storm to look at the tree. I remember how still the air was. At the end of the trunk we could see the dangling roots with dirt still clinging. Branches and debris covered the road. I was amazed that such a tree could fall. Forever after that storm, the empty spot near the corner across the street always reminded of what had stood there.

It has started raining again. I can hear it from the window behind me. That is Nala’s window. She loves leaning on the back of the couch to look out the screen. I don’t know what holds her interest. There are some trees, and you can see the side of the house next door, a rental, but no one is there.

I love living in New England. I love all four seasons, or at least parts of all four seasons. My favorite season is fall on Cape Cod. The weather is fine with warm days and cool nights. Only the weekends are busy with tourists. The roads are back to being ours. Oak tree leaves turn color. They turn a brown red, a deep color. Sugar maple trees, far fewer than the oak, are brilliant in the fall. Their leaves turn bright yellow. The low lying cranberry bogs have ripening fruits which turn the bogs into a display of red, a bright red. The harvest starts in mid to late September. I always stop to watch if I happen on a bog being harvested. The fall is long here on the cape. It lets us forget the short spring.

The sky is cloudy so the house is dark. Outside is humid and warm and even a bit foggy. It rained last night. Everything outside is still wet. The house feels closed in so I have turned on the AC. I’m thinking it’s an inside day, maybe an odd chore day, maybe even a nap day.

I am better today!

My house has spiders’ webs. All the spider babies are out and about skillfully making tiny webs from one spot to another. I found several webs connecting knick-knacks on my windowsills. On them I could see the tiny spiders, tiny dark dots on the webs. I just left them.

The other night Henry came in but Nala didn’t. I waited a while then went looking for her. I heard her crying then I found her in the yard sort of pacing quickly back and forth by one tree. She would stop and look up at the tree then pace again. I presumed there was an animal of sorts, but it was out of her range, hence the crying. I flashed my light but saw nothing. It was then she lost interest and beat me back into the house

When I was a kid, I was never fond of Mondays. They and every weekday thereafter were pretty much the same and out of my control. My mother got me up, fed me breakfast, made sure I was neatly dressed, gave me my lunch then sent me off to school. In school, the bell ran my life. It rang to start school, change classes, have lunch and recess, return to class then more lessons until the bell rang to release me and all the other captives. Only the afternoons were mine. My friends and I played outside, weather permitting. We played close to home. We played until the street lights went on or my mother and every other mother yelled out the door for us to come home for supper. Back then, I never really noticed the sameness of my life. I was never bored with the day to day. That’s just the way it was.

Now, I have what I call my dance card. It is my way to keep track of each day because no day is like any other day. This time of year, my card is mostly filled with uke events, a practice and a lesson and any concerts, and doctors’ appointments. I seem to have a stable of doctors, of ologists like my cardiologist. Somedays I have nothing scheduled, but I don’t get bored. That’s just the way it is.

Coffee is taking a break today to give me a break. I am a bit under the weather. I went from bed to couch, wrapped myself in a light blanket and fell back to sleep. The dogs were patient. They joined me instead of insisting on going out.

The couch will be my refuge today.

Today is breezy and cloudy but still hot at 82°. I haven’t yet started the AC because the house feels cool enough. My dance card is empty for the weekend. I’m thinking to haul out my fall decorations. We’re coming into pumpkin time.

I remember my first grade classroom. It was up a flight of stairs on the right. Just outside the classroom doors was the cloak room with a double row of hooks on two walls. There were so many coats in the winter that you didn’t need a hook. All you needed to do was put your coat between some coats, and it would stay there. I don’t remember my second grade classroom. I just know it was across the hall from my first grade room. Mrs. Kerrigan was my teacher. She was the iconic teacher. I remember she had gray hair always in a bun, wore flowered dresses and clunky heeled shoes. She had an apartment across the street from the church. My third grade was in the cellar of the rectory. It had tables and chairs and a large clock on one wall. The walls had been white-washed. I sat at the table on the left wall. I also remember all the rest of my classrooms, but the only memorable one was my fourth grade room on the second floor in the old school. From fifth to eight grade, I was in the new school, and the classrooms all looked alike.

When I travel, my favorite time of the day is the morning. I love getting up early and wandering the streets. The morning has its own smells and sounds. Trucks stop to unload, people walk to work and buses are filled. I usually find a hole in the wall where I get coffee, sometimes even a pastry and can sit outside to watch the world unfold. I always feel part of it yet removed.

The air conditioner is blasting. It is already 81°. Poor Nala was out for only a short time and came back inside panting. Boxers don’t do well in the heat. Come to think of it, neither do I. Today is a lolling in the cool house day. There is no concert, a scheduling issue, the dump can wait another day, and my larder is full enough. The only thing missing is those Snickers!

When I was a kid, my house was always a cave on hot summer days. Because we had no fans, no way to cool the house, all the shades were down to keep the sun at bay. Once in a while we went to the pool, but it was all the way across town so any benefits from swimming were lost on the walk home. I remember shimmering sidewalks.

When I was young, every summer day was a busy day. I spent almost every day at the playground below my street. I played tennis in the morning and played softball against other playgrounds in the afternoon. I pitched and played first base. There was a horseshoe pit. I was prone to leaners. The activity table, a picnic table, was under the only shady area on the field, off to the side. We played checkers there. I also did crafts. I remember painting a wooden tray with a bird standing on a tree branch beside one white flower. I gave the tray to my mother. I did gimp.

When I was older, I stopped going to the playground. I often went to the library so I could spend my afternoons reading in the darkened, cooler house. At night I had drill practice, mostly on Tuesdays but also some Thursdays. We had competitions every weekend, many times even two competitions. On the off drill nights, my high school friends and I would bowl or even go the drive-in. My life was busy.

In Ghana, school holidays were during our summer months, Ghana’s rainy season. Most holidays I traveled. I’d take a bus to Accra unless I was flush with money and could take a plane from Tamale, 100 miles south of my town, to Accra. I’d stay in the big city a few days, eat at restaurants and see a few movies. I’d catch up with friends at the Peace Corps hostel where we all stayed. Usually I’d get a visa and head to Togo, to Lomé, its capital, for ice cream, French food, shopping at the Grand Marché and at stores filled with imports like Mexico food. I was always amazed at what I could buy. I’d bring home a haul of goodies.

I am a sloth now, a proud sloth, superb at my ability to spend an entire day doing almost nothing except turning the pages of a book. How lovely to while away the hours in a book.

Why on Labor Day does no one work? I didn’t understand that when I was a kid. But when I was older, I understood the day is a celebration, a day, “…to honor and recognize the American labor movement and the works and contributions of laborers to the development and achievements of the United States.” A single day, however, seems a trifle, a jot. Every day should be Labor Day.

Today was the end of summer, not by the calendar but by the start of school. All those days of freedom came crashing down. My life became regimented. Every morning my mother would wake us up, give us breakfast, make sure we were neatly dressed in our uniforms, hand us our lunches and send us on the way. The walk was the same every day. I sat at the same desk. I had lessons in the same order every day. The lunch bell time never varied. We’d run home at the end of the school day not wanting to miss any daylight before the streets lamps sent us all home. Bedtime was the same. The only saving grace was the weekend, especially Saturday. That was, like the Ray Bradbury short story, All Summer in a Day.

Today is back to summer. It is 80°, just about the high for the day. Tonight, though, will be in the 60’s, great for sleeping. My dance card for the week has plenty of empty days. Tuesday and Wednesday are my uke days, practice and a lesson, and that’s it for the week, no concerts. I may have to wash that kitchen floor as busy is no longer an excuse. Perhaps my being a sloth will have to suffice.

Don’t forget: no white after Labor Day!! As if…

The dogs are out in the yard enjoying the day. They come in every now and then to check on me. Nala brings branches and dead leaves with her. I have found pieces of both in the living room, hall and den. I’m thinking vacuuming and a bit of sweeping are in my future.

When I was a kid, my father would go crazy if we left an unrinsed glass on the counter. He called it the height of laziness, but I knew, even back then, he was exaggerating for effect. Still, we complied. It was a small thing and easier than having to listen to him. My father had a pointing finger, also used for effect. When he had one of us cornered for a lecture about something, he used the finger for emphasis by tapping it on our chests. My sisters have a great story about that finger. They used to sneak out of our house when our parents were sleeping. They’d go to the pond on the street over and swim. Our cousin used to spend the summer with us. She became the sacrificial lamb. My father caught them. He was behind them, my two sisters and my cousin, as they walked up the stairs to their bedroom. My two conniving sisters had put my cousin last. She got the finger on her back all the way up the stairs as he lectured them. My sisters still chuckle about that night.

This weekend always had special significance for me. It was the last weekend before the start of school, sort of my last hurrah. Bedtime would again be imposed with the tag line, “You have school tomorrow.” That only made it worse. Labor Day Monday meant the oddity of a Monday bath night. I had to be clean for school which also made it worse. For school I’d wear my new shoes, blue uniform skirt, white blouse and a blue clip-on sort of cowboy tie. I’d eat breakfast then put on my uniform. My new pencil cases and notebooks were already packed into my new school bag. I did it the night before. My mother packed my lunch in my new lunch box. That first lunch was always spectacular, an attempt to dull the pain.

It didn’t take long to get back into the routine which made me both happy and sad.

The wind is blowing. The top branches of the oak trees are swaying. It is a lovely day, a sunny day. The temperature is 74°. My house, though, is cold. It holds the night chill. I had to put on a shirt with long sleeves.

When I was a kid, Saturday was my dad’s chore day. In the morning, he’d collect his cleaned and starched shirts at the Chinese laundry up town, and he’d leave his dirty shirts until the next Saturday. He’d get a trim at the small barber shop just a short way up the street from the laundry. He’d sometimes drop-in to visit a few friends at some stores uptown. In the summer, when he’d get home, he’d mow the lawn and rake the grass. My father loved his lawns. In the fall, he’d rake leaves across the lawn, down the grassy hill into the gutter below the lawn and the sidewalk and then rake them into piles for burning. The gutter was the safe place to burn them. I remember the smoke billowing into the air and the sweet aroma of the leaves burning. On another fall Saturday, once it started getting cold, my father would climb a ladder and remove the screens from the windows. He’d then carry one storm window at a time up the ladder and replace the screen. The screens were stored in the cellar.

My parents had moved off-cape when I was in the Peace Corps. I’d visit for weekends. In the summer, my father always showed off his lawn to me. It was cut in a pattern of rows. It was his pride and joy.

Saturday has always been my favorite day of the week, a play day. When I was a kid, it meant Saturday mornings in front of the TV and Saturday afternoons either at the matinee uptown or on my bike all over town and even into the next towns. When I was in Ghana, Saturday was a day to shop either at the market or to one of the kiosks lining the road. Some Saturday nights the Hotel d’Bull in town showed a movie in the courtyard though I always sat on the roof where there were tables and a few chairs. When I was teaching here, I never did school work on a Saturday. It was still my play day.

I retired nineteen years ago. Since then, I always say every day is a Saturday.