The first thing I did today was sweep my trampoline.
This house came with a trampoline. Two, actually. One small one
for porch jumps and one of those huge ones with netting
that many people got sometime in early high school
and then lots of people broke their arms. My neighbor had one
and so did one of my closest friends and we used to play
“Popcorn,” which is when one person sits on the trampoline
and the other person jumps, and the sitting person bounces
like a popping kernel. Or at least I think that’s how it went.
I swept my trampoline and then did many big jumps
in the center of it and some small running jumps around the perimeter
and then a lot of big jumps in the center again
until I was so tired I slipped out and back into my sandals.
I walked, a little breathless, up the slight hill, towards the shed,
touching the apple trees as I went, even the dead one. I looked
for peaches but didn’t find any. In the shed I found the hand trowel
I used later to wrestle horseradish from the ground. Horseradish!
really puts down roots. I dug and dug and found worms
and found the smell of Passover too, and finally gave up and pulled
so hard at the root that when it finally came out I was flung backwards
into the soft mulch. I laughed at myself and the birds kept on scuttling
on the ground. While I was trampoline-ing, Misha was preparing
for his first day of work. At a farm, of course! Well,
a farmstand. He’s going to sell vegetables and bring home
vegetables. I don’t start as a waitress until Saturday
and today I stayed home to make pickles, My First Pickles.
I had no idea what I was doing and my shorts were too short
when I went to go pick up supplies at the country store. Oh,
well. I bought lids and pickling salt and mustard seed
and a butter dish, for our Vermont butter. But before all this
I picked raspberries in the warm sun for a long time,
maybe two hours, I have no idea but I was singing
for most of it, little ditties like “Oh berries you are the gems
the thorny gemstones of the earth and you my little bees
are buzzing with the song of songs of singsong songs LA
DEE DA DOO DOO DEE DOO DOO OH HONEYBOOBOOS.”
About halfway through I spied two frogs to my right
on the shore of our pond, so I had to go over to see them
(I love frogs and always have), and one hopped away
immediately and the other one let me touch it but
when I touched it, it jumped into the water! Of course
it did. I am always trying to befriend the following creatures
that aren’t interested in my friendship: frogs, toads, chipmunks,
grasshoppers, and a cockatiel named Zeke (“Zeke the Beak”)
that we are currently birdsitting. And today I wanted to sit
on top of that damn bird because he sounded his alarm sound
all the damn day because he misses Misha and who the hell
am I, this girl yelling his name all highpitched, trying to be
the cool birdsitter. I got so frustrated with his loudness
that I thought about sticking him in our new dehydrator
but of course I would NEVER ACTUALLY DO THAT. In fact
this was just an excuse to talk about our new dehydrator
which arrived yesterday. It is the mob boss of all dehydrators.
It’s named The Excalibur and it is all black and huge
like a mobster vehicle and you can dehydrate so many fruits
in it at once it’s like a mass fruit juice removal program.
And before doing any of the other things I mentioned
today, what Misha and I did first was eat our first
apple chips and banana chips. But wait, back
to the pickled, the cucumbers. I sliced them
and stuffed them into jars that I boiled
in a pot you could fit two turkeys in and on top
of each jar I placed a piece of grape leaf, which
supposedly ensures pickle crispness. The whole process
took hours, I have no idea, I was so unaware
that when I was finished I noticed there was a package
on the porch that a human being had dropped off.
A human had been on the porch! There aren’t a lot
of human beings around here, and being human here
is the minority, the butterflies are fair and regal rulers
and the birds are busy at their games. With what was left
of cukes I mixed with overripe tomates and made gazpacho.
Now it’s an hour until Misha pulls into the driveway
and I’m drinking a beer and placing it on the table
that Scott and I built together. We named it
“The baby giraffe” because its legs are so long
and made of old stairway banisters, and if it walked
it would walk like a baby giraffe. People I love are all over
my house, but not all over the yard, where I’d like
them to be. Today I envisioned the music festival
we could throw on our property, and how people could bob
in the pond while listening to Dillon or Sean jam
acoustic. It’s strange that I’m not lonely yet, the grapes
outside keep feeding me and the tomatoes volunteer
themselves inside the greenhouse. I’m hoping hard
for visitors. I’m stocking all the shelves with food
in jars and waiting for the chilly drive to town
where I’ll pull up before the train arrives and jump
to see my friends or family getting off, their faces
not accustomed to the rundown railroad town,
but their faces full accustomed to the way
I greet them, yelling, pull them back into my home.
panache, perhaps 