weekend recap, february 17

1. valentine's candy that I almost ate all by myself | 2. blood orange hearts | 3. flowers from my valentine | 4. sleepy beagle | 5. breakfast of champions | 6. the real "breakfast of champions" | 7. spring training | 8. monuments men at the macarthur monument

Shhhh.... I'm going to let you in on a little secret. So because of the snow that hit the mid-Atlantic this past week, we had a little extra time with Cal at home. He spent one day shadowing a friend of ours who is a judge and the rest of the time resting and doing homework, but now he's back in Richmond and raring to go.

It was a little funny to have him here. Nice, but funny too. There are only three weeks left, and I think we're all sad about that.

I'm not sure what it is, the weird hiccup in our schedule or the heavy, cold rain on Saturday or what, but I'm feeling the weight of not only winter (not really winter) but of all of my accumulated clutter lately. And I really mean weight. As I walked around my house, it felt as if trails of clutter were following along behind me, sending off sparks. It was as if I were wearing a heaving Victorian skirt made of extra ladles, cookie sheets, books I'll never read again and jeans I'll never wear. This skirt has a train made of post-it notes with two words scribbled on them, old CDs I need to burn to my computer, old receipts, and shoes I don't love anymore. It swishes at I walk. The ladle clangs when I go down the stairs.

I don't like this skirt. It's stuffy and hot and hard to get in and out of. But, apparently in another fit of clutter-clearing, I got rid of one of the books I found to be really helpful on the subject. Shrugs.

What about you guys? Even if we're really good at dealing with it, we all have to handle clutter. How do you do it? And honestly, if you just did a bare sketch of my house, it would look like we had things under control, but Neel's phrase for getting rid of this junk is "shaking the dust off your karma." That's what I need to do. Maybe I just need to get to work.

be mine, february 14, 2014

I'm abandoning Five Things to pop in and wish everyone a Happy Valentine's Day! Cal's here, so we're having She Crab Soup for dinner tonight and watching the Olympics. Saving the romantic stuff for next week. Candle-lit dinners, long walks hand in hand. You know, pretty much what we do every night.

When we were coming back from Richmond last week, Neel and our friend Evans got into this bro-versation (that's a conversation between guys) about music and had a little bond over it. (God help me, I wrote "bong" at first instead of "bond," but seriously. It was all above-board. Even if we were talking about the Grateful Dead and Dylan.) All that music got me in the mood for more, so I put a little playlist together and had to put this song by Crosby Stills and Nash on it. 

Helplessly Hoping

Helplessly hoping
Her harlequin hovers nearby
Awaiting a word
Gasping at glimpses
Of gentle true spirit
He runs, wishing he could fly
Only to trip at the sound of good-bye

Wordlessly watching
He waits by the window
And wonders
At the empty place inside
Heartlessly helping himself to her bad dreams
He worries
Did he hear a good-bye? Or even hello?

They are one person
They are two alone
They are three together
They are for each other

Stand by the stairway
You'll see something
Certain to tell you confusion has its cost
Love isn't lying
It's loose in a lady who lingers
Saying she is lost
And choking on hello

They are one person
They are two alone
They are three together
They are for each other

I've always loved that song, and it feels like such a good song for our little family.

They are one person
They are two alone
They are three together
They are for each other

So that's Valentine's around here. Three together, for each other. Turns out, I'm down with that. I hope all of your days are sweet, however you spend them. XO