It’s been a
quiet day here in Watsonville. The hot water heater is still not fixed,
although the necessary part has been delivered. But the electrician had other
jobs to do, and then “hit a wall,” calls to say he will return early in the
morning. Fortunately, it’s not my house, so I don’t have to be up early.
I help my
hostess prepare for her grown son’s visit (he arrives late tonight), and she
gives me a guided tour of the downstairs apartment. We let out the dogs – a
Portuguese water dog and a black spaniel – and walk through the backyard, past
the small garden beds of herbs, fava beans, and onions; the fruit trees,
blossoming plum and peach, hibernating apple and cherry, oranges and limes; and
a tree with lemons almost the size of grapefruit, known as Eureka lemons.
My hostess
shows me the small “graveyard” where the ashes of her parents and her dogs are
buried. She shows me how to suck sweet nector from salvia petals. We pass
dried debris washed ashore from the torrential rains the previous weeks.
In
the evening we have a dinner of black bean soup (recipe courtesy of the NewYork Times) over rice, with pickled onions, avocado, cilantro, and crema. Delicious. And
then I write this.
I’m
participating in the 10th annual Slice of Life Challenge over at Two
Writing Teachers. This is day two of the
thirty-one-day challenge. It’s not too late to make space for daily
writing in a community that is encouraging, enthusiastic, and eager to read
what you have to slice about. Join in!
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