257/365

things I appreciate now that I didn't thirty years ago:

birds 
coffee
embroidery
mornings
avocados
artichokes
public radio
hot tea
hot sauce
house plants
historical fiction
home grown tomatoes
orange marmalade
documentaries
fleetwood mac
reading glasses
sunsets

a love letter of sorts

to summer, which is not over, not even close, even though we've been tricked into thinking it is, second week of school and all. 

and to lightning bugs, which I never ever (ever) get tired of, even after 48 years of living. gimme all the humidity in the world if it means I get lightning bugs every summer.

anyway, this is what I watch when I'm riddled with anxiety (which, unfortunately, is often these days). this little film I made three years ago is what I watch when it feels like I'm drowning. 

256/365

another list for those of us who loved ms. morrison, because there's just too much good out there right now, too good not to share:

toni morrison, remembered by writers
toni morrison, a quick but powerful story
and, toni morrison dancing (good lord, with bill t. jones)

255/365

nicknames I have been assigned over the course of my life:

andie
andie pandie
andromeda
ahn drey ah
hula
hulita
lady A

some stuck, some didn't. 

the truth is that I always sort of loved andromeda.

254/365

guilty pleasures, part three:

fruity pebbles in coffee mugs

bad reality television

corn dogs

253/365

notable items found on maira kalman's inspiration board:

a small metal placard that said OPEN
hotel linens used as paint rags
a pair of small black socks
a dog named susan
a pink ticket with the number 32 
a postcard of a pair of ruby red lips
a drawing titled last night I dreamt a rhino came to my house
a postcard of a tree in full bloom
one black glove with No. 6 painted on it in white
old photographs of boys wearing hats
old photographs of girls with silk bows in their hair
two rusted skeleton keys
a piece of paper that said REMEMBER THIS MOMENT
a cardboard sign with a picture of a hot dog on it
a toothbrush still in the package
a piece of gold foiled paper
a collected leaf
a photograph of a child with a box on his head
a postcard collection of erupting volcanoes
a pink post-it with the words good lunch scribbled on it
a polaroid of a tin bucket
a typed list I could not read
a ruta baga seed packet
a mixed california poppies seed packet
a flashcard that read 5+9
a collection of candy-colored buttons
a wax bag with pink and white stripes
a mammoth green tassel
a red turkish fez with the words HEY WILLY embroidered on it
a small white paper apron
a little lulu comic book
a candy bar poem
a collection of photographs of dancers (including the one that inspired the cover of this book)
a collection of photographs of children with things on their heads
a small metal placard that said SHUT

(as seen at the high a few weeks ago)
(maira kalman, I love you)

252/365

things that are not for me, part one:

cilantro
football
nashville

except for your fleamarket, nashville. your fleamarket I will take. 

251/365

small pleasures, part ten:

breakfast in bed
flowers cut from the side of the road
pajamas at the end of the day
an empty movie theatre
a secret candy stash
hammock lounging
clean dishes

250/365

a list for those of us who loved ms. morrison:

you don't know anything, and other writing advice
meaning, without the white gaze: a memoir written for her, and for pecola breedlove
and finally, a magnificent 1978 toni morrison reading from the magnificent song of solomon 

(song of solomon broke me wide open 25 years ago-- forever grateful for her work, for her presence in this world)

249/365

lists I am unable to make right now:

ordinary moments for remembering, the morning we left to take ava to college
all the things I felt, all of them 
any list, any list at all

I am outside my own body, hovering somewhere between heartbreak and elation. motherhood is contradictory at every turn, the map always changing, always bending, curving towards the unknown.

248/365

lists I am unable to make right now:

ordinary moments for remembering, on the night before ava leaves for college 
questions I'd like to ask my mom about this particular part of motherhood
times I cried about it this week 

247/365

things about sunday:

songs we sang together in the church with the wooden floors that creak when we sway
the scent of art gum erasers that took me right back to my younger, more possible self
the very last moments of summer break, the knowing of it, the mourning of it

246/365

words I had to look up in the dictionary in july:

gelid
porcine
usufruct
quorum
exegesis
funambulist
ululate

245/365

books I read in july:

florida (lauren groff)
daisy jones & the six (taylor jenkins reid)
lost children archive (valeria luiselli)

it needs to be said: lost children archive is an extraordinary book. florida is too. the first of the books I've read this year that I believe to be great-- really and truly-- great. and lost children archive deserves its own list, I think. 

244/365

on this first day of august:

orientation, completed
school supply list, acquired
defeat, accepted