Solitary

Today was something of an oasis of contentment for me. I am a person who loves people, but who also needs a lot of alone time. Since Walter retired, I don’t get much alone time anymore. Today, Walter had agreed to help a friend from church in his yard, and Jasper went with him because there was a lot to do. They ended up being gone until quite late in the afternoon—and fortunately, Walter was feeling up to it.

So what did I do with my glorious solitude? Well, obviously I did my Bible reading. And Wednesday is my foot-soaking day, so I did that while enjoying my morning tea. I did some organizing and finished cleaning out a cupboard. I did some knitting. Basically, I did everything I would have done anyway, but I just enjoyed it more because I had the house to myself.

This afternoon I drove up to Hobby Lobby to get a couple of things and then stopped at Kroger to stock up on cream. Halfway through the afternoon, I suddenly remembered that I had planned to finish reading the book club book for church by tonight, so I fired up my Kindle and read while on my exercise bike and while drinking tea. I didn’t quite finish it, but I still intend to.

Walter and Jasper didn’t get back until almost 5:00. They were tired. And there ended up being a misunderstanding about their pay, so they only got half of what they expected. But, like we always say, some money is better than no money. And it will help with gas on our upcoming trip.

We went to the church dinner and sat at a table with mostly friends from Sunday School. And interestingly enough, part of the discussion was about solitude and how it differs from isolation.

Earlier this week, we heard from Amano that they are working on our work permits, and they said that it would be helpful if Walter could produce his previous Zambian work permit—from over 30 years ago! He had no idea where to even look for it, but guess what? He found it this evening after we got back from church.

So he was able to scan it to send to Amano. We are still waiting to hear if we’ve been accepted by CTEN. We had really hoped to hear by now.

And finally, our daytime temperatures have been in the 80s for over a week now, so tonight Walter relented and turned on the air conditioning. Thank goodness!

Joy Spark: Having the house to myself all day!

Wednesday Word of the Day

boscage—a mass of trees, shrubs, or a thicket. At this time of year, the boscage is humming with bees and beginning to bloom.

Parting Shot:

Yes, I know they’re weeds, but they’re pretty right now. Besides, if we pulled all the weeds out of our yard we wouldn’t even have a lawn!