Today is a lovely fall day. The sun is staying around. It was missing most of the week hidden by rain and clouds. Everything is glinting in the light, especially the leaves dangling from the lower branches. The sky is a light blue. The breeze is every now and then. It is 57°, the high for the day. The weekend will be a pretty one.

My dance card still has two events, today and tomorrow. I didn’t post yesterday because of the concert and may not post tomorrow for the same reason. I have to be in Hyannis at eleven thirty. This has been the busiest week I can remember in a long time. I’m tired.

When I was a kid, life was easy. During the week was school. Every day was the same. When my mother woke me up, she already had breakfast ready. The menu mostly depended on the weather, but I could count on my cup of cocoa and my brother’s tea, served in a pot. Sometimes we had eggs with toast while on cold days we often had oatmeal. My mother did her best to beat down the oatmeal lumps, but a few sneaked through. I didn’t care. I never ate naked oatmeal. Mine was always drowning in milk and covered in sugar. Once in a while I’d add cinnamon. After breakfast it was time to get dressed. I didn’t have to choose my clothes. I wore my uniform, but I did get to pick my socks. Sometimes I wore short socks, but in the cold I often wore knee socks. My friend and I walked to school together, the same way every day. I loved that walk. The straightaway was on a sidewalk with branches overhead. The sunlight was here and there. We’d sometimes jump from spot to spot. We’d cross the street, and school was right there. We’d wait in the schoolyard for the bell.

I was a dreamer. I didn’t plan day to day, but I did plan for when I was older. I knew I’d go to college, the first to go in my extended family. I knew I’d see the world. No one in my family traveled far, but I knew I would. I never doubted that my dreams would come true.

After Ghana, the first trip I made was to Europe. I went to Finland then on to Russia. I’ll never forget that trip. I ate reindeer in the Arctic Circle when it was midnight sun time. I took a train from Helsinki to Leningrad. Only three of us were on the through car. It got dis-attached from the Finnish train and added to the Russian train. One uniformed train person stayed in the car. She gave us tea, lots of tea served in clear glass cups.

I always think myself lucky. My life has been interesting. It has been all I dreamed it would be.

The sun was through the clouds earlier, and I saw a bit of blue, but both have disappeared. The weather report calls for light rain. It is chilly at 50°. Today might even be light coat weather.

This is a busy week for me, all uke. I’ve already had practice and my lesson. Today, tomorrow and Sunday are concert days. The concert book is songs of the sea. On Saturday I am playing with a few friends at an ordination. We will play the dismissal song. My dance card groans.

I am back to being pleasant. I have my coffee. The animals don’t avoid me anymore. It is a happy household.

When I was in Ghana, tea was the Ghanaian drink of choice. I had to buy instant coffee. Ghanaians didn’t drink milk either so I had to buy canned milk. Every morning I drank at least two cups of coffee, one with breakfast and another after teaching a class or two. I had a giant mug. I used to sit on my small porch and drink the later cups of coffee. I loved watching the world go by. Little kids walked passed my house in one direction to the primary school while older kids also walked passed my house but in the other direction to the middle school. Both schools were just outside my school fence so through my school was a shortcut. I was an attraction. Kids either said good morning or stared at me.

I had eggs and toast every morning for breakfast. They were cooked over a small charcoal burner. The eggs were cooked in groundnut oil, peanut oil to us, which gave the eggs the best flavor. The toast was buttered with margarine (I couldn’t resist the word play). Because butter came in a can and was expensive, I only bought it for holidays and for baking. Margarine was also sold in a can, but it was fairly inexpensive.

I never minded the margarine, canned milk and, aghast, the instant coffee. After a while, they tasted just fine. In Ghana I learned to make good with what was available.