Julia Park Tracey

I went into the grocery store Tuesday night, on my way to a meeting with my women’s group, and as I was running in, careful not to slip on the puddled linoleum in my high-heeled boots, I spied something in the garbage can. It was a dollar bill. Shut up — you’d stop, too. Someone had wadded up the receipt and tossed it, and the dollar that was the stranger’s change ended up in the trash as well. I looked around, nobody was there but me, and so into my pocket it went. After my meeting, I had a moment to pause and pulled out the receipt, with the crisp…

…and way too much rain. It’s beyond cliche to talk of webbed feet and wrinkled fingers, but I am getting sick of wearing (the same) pants and boots all the time. And I know that, heading off to Europe in about 10 days, it’ll probably rain there all the time. That’s easier to take if it’s a change in the weather. But endless days of dreary rain…Bah! Oh for some sunshine. O, for summer. At least the clocks have changed. I did a blonde thing over the Daylight Saving Time clock-change. We changed the clocks at Patrick’s house, then came back here the next night (Sunday). I saw Ana fiddling…

The other morning I got into the shower and felt a pang of hunger. I could smell that someone was cooking breakfast from nearby, maybe the neighbor downstairs, or possibly next door. I love the smell of hickory smoke. And I love the smell of cooking bacon. Then as I leaned back into the hot jet of water in the shower and my hair began to drip and curl into sodden tendrils, I realized — that smell. That bacon smell. It’s me. Stop laughing. It’s because we had a fire in our fire pit the night before. And I stood in the smoke and felt warm and very cozy, despite…

At last, another… Missive from MiaOkay, we are here [in Ireland for St. Patrick’s Day]!! Yesterday we went to Howth (where I called you) and it was an adorable little fishing village right on the water. Walked along the pier and saw boats, wandered through the streets and saw a huge church (funeral happening so couldn’t get in) and also a really cool graveyard. We walked around and looked at all the Irish names. Went home and spent a lovely evening being pampered by the fire with a delicious meal of steak, salmon, veggies (all home-grown), all which Nula (lindsay’ aunt) made. She’s wonderful, goes upstairs and turns our electric…

If there is one thing that’s certain, besides death and taxes, it’s that teenagers will do what they can to vex their parents. Hey, I did it in my day, and my girls are certainly doing their part. For example, in my day, we wouldn’t be seen dead in public with an umbrella – it was much cooler to have dripping wet hair than to carry a stupid umbrella, which my parents couldn’t understand. There were days when I left the house with an umbrella in hand, then ditched it in the bushes as soon as I was out of sight. And we didn’t use backpacks then – only hippies…