Spring, and a Man in Yellow

Yes, I know, I've been a slacker about blogging lately.  However, I have a perfectly viable excuse in the form of a rather nasty cold which has been plaguing me this week.  So basically I've been coming home from work each day to roam about in a fog, blowing my nose and grunting in a truly unattractive way, which doesn't really make for good blogging material.


We've had beautiful weather the past few days, and it really looks like spring is on its way at last.  For additional proof, when I went to pay our utility bill at City Hall I saw crocuses coming up in their flower beds.  The sight of them made bill-paying much more thrilling than usual.  Aaron and I have also been planning our garden... or rather, standing in the middle of the backyard pointing and saying, "we should put these over there, or maybe against the fence."  This is very exciting.  We moved into the house too late last year to plant much of anything, and before that we lived in an upstairs apartment.  I'm looking forward to getting my hands in the dirt again.


On the writing front, I'm still working on the new novel, though it has been moving rather slowly again thanks to the busyness of life in general.  I did send a (very) short story to the 100 Words Or Less contest, which is a first for me, so we'll see how that goes.  I haven't done much with short stories lately, but I'd been playing around with this one since the autumn.  I'll be a good blogger and paste it below.  It all started with an incredibly surreal moment last September when I was out for a walk.  I glanced down a side-street and saw a man dressed all in yellow (yellow pants, yellow shirt, everything) standing under a tree with leaves of nearly the exact same color.  Who knows where the rest came from.

Recurring Dream

In my dream there are three of us: you, me, and the man dressed in yellow.  Though he might have been a tree.  Might have been, but wasn’t.

We say we are looking for an elephant.  A small one -- or a kangaroo.

He says he saw an elephant once, in Portugal.  But it might have been a large dog.  Kangaroos now, he’s never seen those.

You ask, “Was the elephant in a zoo?”

He says, “No, it was on a street in Lisbon; playing a concertina.”

You take my hand, adventure in your eyes, and just then, my dream dies.

111 on 1-11-11

I must have some sort of celebration.  It is the eleventh day of the first month of 2011, and at this moment my blog has been viewed 111 times so far this month.  So thank you, anonymous 111th viewer, for turning a rather dreary day into something more auspicious.


It's cold today, not just ordinary winter cold, but that fierce biting cold that creeps into your bones until you feel like you'll never really be warm again.  That type of cold doesn't seem to care what the thermometer says.  Sometimes I can feel it on a summer day, although it does come more often in the winter.  It's cold the way some people's houses are cold.  It doesn't matter what the thermostat says.  It's simply cold, uninviting.  It doesn't want you there.  It wants to freeze you out.  Of course, this could only be my overactive imagination, but I don't think so.  The only solution is to warm it somehow, like trying to thaw open the car door with a hair dryer.


This afternoon my warming solution is hot cocoa in a tea-cup, one hour of silence, the music of A. R. Rahman, a ballet class, and a quiet evening with my husband.