Friday Sabbath

A mixed bag for my personal Sabbath:

StrongOpinions left for home after spending a week with us. It was good to see her, but it was too short a trip (even though it is shocking how much stuff one 23 year old girl can spread around the house in a week). Her buddy D come down from NoVA to hang with us, and he drove her to the airport at 4:30 am.

Yes, I was awake, and not only because I needed to lock the door behind her. I really, really needed to give her a hug before she left, because I don't get enough of them these days.

Last evening was the usual chaos of trying to get stuff done prior to her trip, namely sewing three shirts for her (one black, one white, one ecru lace), washing laundry, picking up some items that are only available here...I was pretty fried after a long day going back and forth to meetings an hour away, and cooking for supper and such, but it was actually good to do this kind of stuff rather than the usual living in my monkey mind.

After she left this morning I dozed off for a bit, then got up, had a blessedly silent time of tea and the paper, then went off to spend an hour with my spiritual director.

And then I went to Bizarre Bazaar. Sort of a Southern-style craft fair on steroids. I saw a whole lot of personalized polka dot items, from dog dresses (yes, you read that right), to neoprene purses designed to hold your own personal six-back nice and chilled, to powdered dip mixes, to some of the trashiest jewelry since Dolly Parton had a bad dream, to stuff meant to evoke a trip to "The Rivah" (folks go down to their place on the rivah, meaning the Rappahannock River, in the summertime round heah). Best item of the day, which I did NOT buy: a sleep t-shirt that read "My sex life isn't dead, but vultures are circling overhead." I doubt PH would have thought it was all that cute.

I restrained myself from purchasing personalized rubber garden boots and simply found two solid color pashminas to add to the collection (aqua and cerulean), a pair of dogwood earrings and a calligraphed picture that will be a gift to someone getting ordained in June.

How tasteful of me.

I did, however, try a little taste of every damn thing that they were offering in the food vendors (fudge, of course; toffee; powdered mixes that you mush up with olive oil or cream cheese or sour cream to make party dips). I did not calculate the Weight Watcher points for all these tastes, since it is my sabbath...

thanks be to God.