Mark: Sunday Morning, July 7

Before the Women's World Cup:

So, my intention with this writing project was to try and make a daily practice of being present and grateful, but as it turns out, that's a high bar.  Or, at least it is to start out.  Anyway, here's what I can count as gratitudes from the weekend:

• Friday was one of those days where all day long, things were generally fine - and also a little off.  But Saturday morning, after a good night's sleep, the world felt fresh and new again.  My neighbor (who is very close by because I live in an attached row house) has had this ugly shed on the back of his house that I can see out my kitchen door for as long as I've lived here.  That's nine years of looking out the window and all shingles falling off of an ugly shed.  Yesterday, somewhat out of the blue, when I got up, there were workers in the back, tearing the old shed down.  Where there used to be an ugly wall, there's now a little extra light, that let's me see some more air and the trees across the alley.  I'm grateful for the days when walls come down.

• Saturday afternoon, I also talked to my sister for a bit.  We have been in a groove for the last year or two where we usually talk daily, sometimes more.  She was out with our mom yesterday and it sounds like things aren't going great -- so I called thinking I'd check in on that.  But, it turned into something so much better.  She was sitting outside on their front lawn with Eleanor, who's not just shy of her first birthday.  The baby had been cranky earlier, but was now delighting in playing in the grass.  Colleen said that she'd also been in a bad mood - which was why she grabbed a beer and a jar full of blueberries for the baby and had an impromptu picnic on the front lawn.  The sunshine and fresh air changed them both.  Eleanor, juuuuust on the verge of being able to stand on her own and take her first steps, was smiling at her mom, patting her leg and heart, and cooing into the empty blueberry jar.  Colleen said it made her realize once again that Eleanor is already one of her very favorite people in the whole wide world.  That was a great moment to pop into through the magic of cell phones.

• The DC swamp is hot and muggy as fuck this Fourth of July weekend.  I spent yesterday at the pool with a couple of friends, sipping rose from water bottles, eating gummy bears, and occasionally dipping into the pool.  But, mostly, I tried to keep my gaze set to the blue sky and the giant clouds that were floating by.  The way they changed shape and light as they wafted by.  It was the perfect juxtaposition to the conspiratorial cackling and whispering of my friends (who were a light show of their own).