Abundance

 Our lives and our house have been full and good this week.  We happily welcomed our dear friend Leigh and her son to stay until the 5th, and (just as I had hoped!) their presence has acted as a magnet for people I care about to flock to my house.  This is so great.  A little tiring and messy, but really great.

A picture tour of the busy, noisy, lake-and-ice cream-and-firefly filled magic of the past few days:

Dinner on Saturday. Some of my very favorite people in the world, a buggy but lovely night in the yard, a kiddie pool, and really really good chicken.

Sunday-- a trip to Rocky River Beach.  Because it wouldn't be Sunday without it.  And Leigh had never been to Lake Erie.  And the day was luscious.  So how could we not?

Sunday afternoon and evening-- a constant and increasing stream of people I like, gathering at my house.  Mike smoked three chickens.  Meg drove in from Buffalo.  We gathered Hiramites like moths to a flame, and we drank and talked for like 8 hours.  It was really nice.

The younger set, at dinner.  Of course it would rain right at dinner.  We made do.  The house expanded to fit the crowd, and it was a little hot and sticky in here, but we made do.

What a great yardfull of kids.  I love these children.  

 The later portion of the evening....Our traditional Loud Ladies of Hiram event.  The carousing only lasted til about 1am (Monday mornings will do that to you) but it was sufficiently noisy to keep our title.  It was lovely to alternately reminisce and make raunchy jokes with these women.  Some things never change.  Like us. :)

 Monday:  Leigh and I ventured to Lake Farmpark with the crew, only to find that it is now closed on Mondays.  So, we explored Penitentiary Glen instead.  It was a hot day and we all kind of wilted by the time we made it home, but I think the kids had fun.

Monday night, Mike took Leigh out to dinner and Nat and I took the assembled company out for ice cream and back to the lake.  It was not a good-news day in my corner of the world, with a disappointing Supreme Court decision and a fatal shooting at a local business combining to make me feel quite pessimistic about the state of my city and country. I needed a little bit of summertime goodness to reassure my soul.  Mitchell's and Rocky River Beach delivered.

Ivy's art

Jack and Wyatt's art

How can anything be wrong in a world with this in it??

Oh, and we caught fireflies in the growing dark overlooking the lake.  The look on Jack's face says it all.

Today, Nat and I celebrated our eight year anniversary with a trip downtown for the world's best chicken wings and a lot of walking through arcades.  In the midst of a hot day full of tired children and recovering from the exhaustion of extended socialization (full houses are so good!  and so hard for an introvert to deal with!), our hours together today served to underscore the abundance in our lives.  We have each other, after all.  And we live in this really remarkable city (nothing like showing it off to a friend, to remind us...).  And we have wonderful healthy kids and amazing deep friendships and a comfortable home and plenty to eat.  And we can look at the sky, with its clouds flying past the tops of the skyscrapers, and the lake, beckoning and shining off into forever.  And we can drink a couple of beers in the afternoon and laugh uproariously about silly, silly inside jokes.   We are so lucky.

In gratitude,

A.