There is something special about the quality of light at this time of year. It’s soft. Golden. The sun dips lower and lower and barely makes it above our trees. In the morning the light sifts through the trees creating glorious sunbeams. It shines through droplets of water leftover from the previous night’s rain, and a spider’s web.

The pool, now closed for the winter, never makes it into the full sunlight.

The hours of sunlight we can count on having each day get fewer and fewer. Night falls faster and faster. The sun is reluctant to wake up. Prepare to spend more time inside it seems to be saying.

The moon takes over the sun’s job and also rises through the trees, bathing the yard in its pale shimmery light.

I don’t know about you but I am taking in all of this golden light that I can!

Whew! Who turned up the heat? I guess I should be careful what I wish for. Temperatures soared this weekend into the high 80’s and with the humidity of 99% to 100% it felt more like the 90’s! Our good friend Carolyn was down visiting us from Rhode Island this weekend.

Even with the predicted heat we dressed up in our medieval garb and went to the Renaissance Faire. As you already know, I love dressing up for the Faire! Just a wench at heart I guess.

I don’t know how they wore the clothing they did back then and not keel over from heat prostration! We managed to catch a few shows, have some libations and lunch and walk around a bit, but four hours was about all any of us could take of the sun and heat.

I’m not sure why this guy they pulled out of the audience to assist Dextre was smiling. I don’t think I’d be smiling with a guy tossing fire brands over my head while squatting on my shoulders, would you?

Then we came home and went to a resort where the three of us bowled; Rick and I played nine holes of golf and a game of table tennis; Rick went wake boarding on a ski-doo, participated in a bike race and played frisbee with a dog; and Carolyn flew an airplane around the island. Pretty cool, huh?

On Sunday we went to the Warwick farmer’s market. It was the most crowded I have ever seen it! What was strange was to see the varieties of apples and even a few pears showing up already. The summer-less summer has everything confused. We bought everything we needed for our pear salad for lunch right at the market. These plums looked yummy but we didn’t buy any. I just liked the way they looked.

The rest of Sunday was spent floating around the pool. Heaven.

And, oh, in case you’re wondering about that great resort we went to on Saturday, you can check it out here:

We never had to leave our comfortable air-conditioned home!

Had you going, didn’t I?

I lay on my float, belly down, fingers and toes dangling in the cool water. The warm sun beating on my back is turning my flesh and bones to the viscosity of jelly. I feel my internal self flowing outward from my body. Letting go. Releasing tensions and worries. It’s difficult to resist the temptation not to nod off. I turn over to toast the other side.

I hear cicadas (!) in the treetops, there is a Snowberry Clearwing Hummingbird Moth (!) drinking nectar from the poolside flowers, hawks ride high in the sky on thermals, and a dragonfly (!) whirs by.

Can a day be any more perfect?

Yes, actually it could. Rick leaves today for nearly a week on business. We’ll all miss him!

I don’t know why I’m sitting here trying to blog today. I am kind of in a funk and not really sure why. I have no reason to be. I feel like summer is passing me by and soon it will be gone and I won’t have done any of the things I intended to do. I had a goal of keeping my flower beds weed free and it all started out so well. Then the rains came and so did the weeds. I battled them for a while but now I just looked at them this weekend and said go ahead, clog my flower bed, see if I care! I’ve given up. Plus, I think that in my zeal to weed early on I must have pulled out my coneflowers since not one do I have now. Bummer.

It is still not really summer here. More like an extended spring. The pool temperature I think has topped out at 78 degrees on a good day. Yesterday three-quarters of an inch of cool rain fell over much of the day and I’m sure the pool temp will fall by a few degrees too. It’s just sad. I do like the cool nights for pleasant sleeping but I really could use a little more heat. I think we may have broken 80 degrees once or twice. My day lilies did not bloom as vigorously as years past and we’ve not had the dragonflies we normally do. They usually love the lilies. Neither have I seen my little buddies the hummingbird moths, and only a few butterflies so far. We still have a few hanger-on fireflies, still looking for love (most likely in all the wrong places), winking high in the treetops. And the cicadas? I am really not sure they will make an appearance this year. I’m afraid it may be too cool for them. I associate the sound of cicadas with hot weather and it’s not looking good!

There are so many things to blog about that I have just let pass me by.

Like the day we had two trees removed from our front side yard. It was fascinating to watch how quickly and easily the tree removal crew took them down. And how their super-charged shredding machine chewed up huge branches and limbs into mulch in a matter of seconds. We kept the wood from the trunks of the trees and will season it for use in a year or so. One tree was a black birch and when they cut it the smell of root beer, or to be more exact—birch beer—permeated the air for hours afterwards. I can still press my nose to the pieces of wood and smell that wonderful odor.

Like the two tea towels I finished.

Like the rest of the photos from our trip to San Miguel.

Like the somewhat upscale dinner we gave for a few friends of ours on Saturday night.

Like the great walk we took through the old Jungle Habitat with the dogs on Sunday. (Jungle Habitat is a story within itself! Another abandoned New Jersey attraction.)

All likely topics to blog about, but yet, I didn’t. Or haven’t. I need to get on with it here!

Watch this space ...

Edited on Wednesday afternoon to add:
Okay, so I lied. But not on purpose.
I went out to take some photos around noon today and these three things were different than my post above.
It was steamy and very warm. My camera lens even fogged up!
I heard a cicada!
I found one coneflower blooming and several others about to!
So, there you have the latest.
I’m thrilled about all three things above.
Well…maybe not so much the foggy camera lens ...

Beergaritas poolside.