A Woman's Work

Hello there, friend! Remember me?  It's been a while.  I've been meaning to write, but somehow the time gets away from me.  You know how it goes.
My face-to-face class got cancelled, but I am teaching another new online course, which means that even though I don't go anywhere, my spare time (between chores and child-rearing) is devoted to that line of work.

I usually work when the baby is sleeping, during naps or at night.  Bruce's parents kindly gave us their old desk, the one I worked at in their house, because they no longer need it.  It's set up in one corner of the basement.  Bruce rigged my old desktop monitor to my laptop, so now it's like a real office.  Eventually I'd like to get library-style bookshelves with the cupboards on the bottom to put some of my English books.  I also want to frame and hang my degrees some day.  In the meantime, I put up my trusted old friends: a copy of Robert Pinsky's poem "Library Scene" and by the window, a small print of Van Gogh's "Still Life with Bible."

On a given day, I wake up and go get Emmie, who's standing in her crib, ready to tell me that she's "wet."  I change her, and we go downstairs for breakfast.  I give her some milk and cereal, which she takes over to the front window.  One of the wonderful things about moving when we did is that we were able to enjoy all the nice weather in the new house.  I open the curtains and windows.  Emmie observes the goings-on of our little street.  Minnie the cat squats by the back patio door, hungrily eyeing the birds as they flit about the yard.

I start the coffee and make some breakfast like oatmeal or toast with fruit, which Emmie and I share.  By mid-morning, if it's nice outside, I try to start some laundry.  It's funny to think that I do my chores based around the weather, but we don't have a clothes dryer yet.  Instead, Bruce hung a clothesline in the back corner of the fence.  That Bruce - he surprises me every day with his endless handiness.  There's just something about the fresh scent of clothes hung outside that a dryer could never replicate.

Emmie and I play inside or outside for a while and then have lunch.  She naps in the early afternoon, and I shower and work or relax.  Then Bruce is home and it's time for dinner.  Maybe we go for a walk the evening.  We've been trying to explore our town when we have the energy.  One night we walked to the ice cream shop that happens to only be 15 minutes away on foot.  Another night we drove down to the river and strolled around the bordering path.  Then bedtime for the baby and chill time for Mama and Dada.  Most nights, we've been able to sleep with the windows open.

Today I am feeling especially like a homemaker.  I donned an apron and baked a loaf of banana bread for a friend who just gave birth.  The whole house filled with the warm, sweet smell.  I hung some clothes on the line and stood back to admire my yard.  I feel like I'm from another, simpler time, where woman's daily work was to keep house.  I'm enjoying it more than I could have ever known.

In fact, I am grateful for it.