Springtime in the Rockies

Inspirational song: Rocky Mountain High (John Denver)

This must count as a quintessential Colorado spring day. It had everything: racing to the locally-owned plant nursery to elbow my way past crowds of people in the rose greenhouse (it really was packed) to acquire my precious Lady of Shallott orange English shrub rose. I waited a whole year for that one. Then we zipped over to the Oskar Blues taproom for a release of a limited edition coffee/vanilla beer. There was gardening. There was playing with dogs. There was a well-mannered squirrel who begged for walnuts. There was a mix of sun and cloudy skies. It was warmer than it ought to have been in April, yet colder in the house than I expected it to be. In short, a perfect day. I'll get to how the night is planned in a second.

When I first started this blog, exactly six years ago today, I wrote in the daytime. I made a point of posting each evening before eight, when the time and date stamp on my dashboard switched over. As the years progressed, I got lazier. I got a little bored with writing. I started running out of new ideas, and now, almost 2200 nights later, I often don't start writing until midnight, and I can't sleep until it's done. It is unusual that I'm writing while there's still light out, dim as it may be. When I get home tonight, I'll feel like something is missing, when I crawl straight into bed without opening the laptop. But it will be nice to be up on my obligations early, so I can do what I want tonight.

I've been thinking. You know, I have lupus. I have fibromyalgia. I have arthritis. And now they have informed me I have cancer. I live in Colorado. Tell me one good reason for me not to use all the tools at my disposal to lessen my pain and improve my condition, especially when my rheumatologist is quite supportive of me finding relief in something other than oil of the poppy.

I'm celebrating the holiday today. I'm a grownup and I can make this choice without feeling guilty about it. I'm heading next door where we will eat tater tots and ice cream sundaes and watch goofy movies all night. I'm bringing brownies. I spent the last couple hours attempting my first infusion in butter, and that went into the brownie mix. No idea how strong or weak they will be. I don't think I care. I think the liberating feeling of giving myself permission to partake is high enough.