around the house

I killed a stinging bug. (Chris: Yellow jacket? Yes?)

With a book. In the palm of my hand.


And I broke a window.

I also received this in the mail.


It is absolutely beautiful and matches a shower gift I received.

It also did not so much like the post office; the glass shattered.


Of course, recently I have become addicted to framing and hanging broadsides, so when I picked up my recent framing project (the programs from our wedding--thanks, Brian!), I was able to drop off this new artwork and have the glass replaced, along with another broadside, the fifth they have framed, with five more waiting (thank goodness Husband doesn't mind our house littered with poetry).


And the thing is, I'm used to picking up glass.

I have upended recycling twice. Once in Winona, at the Husband's apartment complex, down the stairs, and the other time, in the parking garage of a place I lived near St Paul.

I am not known for my grace. In fact, much the opposite.


The saddest thing today, however, was cutting down our young maple. Zephyr pulled the bark off it, which prevents the retention of moisture, and when we had our severe drought (which, I know is such a strange memory, given the hail and the flooding this summer), and I left for my theatre course and we left for our honeymoon... well, we lost our baby maple tree. I cannot even explain how sad I am at this. We planted a dogwood when we moved in--one of those twig-sized seedlings, so it's not that sad, not sad like losing the tree that symbolically represents our new changes, but it's still such a young tree, so beloved. I told the Husband we had to put a new maple in this weekend, or I might spiral into sadness. Let's hope he's OK with this; he wants to put in an apple tree. I am fine with both--we have a decent patch for our backyard and some checks from the wedding.

And I did check--I went to the nursery and asked, and they confirmed it--and the trunk was completely dry and there was no green.

As Colin, from The Secret Garden, might put it, the tree was not wick. This does not prevent me from being deeply saddened; I feel like I've let our little lost tree down.