Curled and curling.

Tonight I battle back against meanness, resolve once again to refuse diminishing.  Some things I don't see coming until I'm in them, by which point there's no way out.  I will not allow myself to be so soured.   

Several times this afternoon, I tracked out into the mud to try to see these ferns that are furling right outside my office.  On my first try, the gutters above me soaked my back as I bent and crouched; on my second try, the camera's battery gave up.  Both times, I proceeded to track mud into the officehouse with me--just when we've finally stopped dragging mud in from all corners of the nearby ground.  Nothing quite gets all the turns and whirls of these massive ferns, which make their way despite the nonsense that's happened all around my building this year.  They make their way; they curl out their tiny fineness.

Redbudding.

Already the day has gone over mostly to miscellany: meetings, chats, filing forms, supporting petitions.  The way here allowed a branch of beauty; the way home will involve handing off a red typewriter.  Writing needs to happen and wants to, though I am not yet fully willing it.

I begin to wonder whether I'll ever again offer images of anything but flowers.  They loom so large in my field of vision these days, not least because they're all around, shedding floating petals, hiding chattering skittery birds.

* * *

Later in the day: strangely enough, once I sat down with the paper I needed to turn in, I made my peace with what it is and was and sent it off.  I want it to be bigger and better than it is--or at least better than it is--but more than thirty years of feeling that way about so many things about myself and my life has pretty much inured me to the less friendly aspects of said desire.  Plus, I now get to have a night's sleep before restarting myself.