the purring

today, a day off, a lovely day.

waking up, doing my thing, uninterrupted even inadvertently. coffee, breakfast, then reading on the porch until my mother comes by.

she shows me the photo album she fished out, with pictures of my parents' honeymoon on the icefields, my baby pictures, pictures of my sister and relatives. mixed emotions surface, but mostly i am glad simply to be that much more informed of my past.

we set out, shopping for a spring coat, in this weird retrograded moment. maybe it reminds me of what shopping for back to school clothes could have been, if we had tuned into each other like we did today, graciously reaching out instead of cloaking ourselves in pain. it was entirely ... amenable.

after slogging it through the indie clothing boutiques, we finally found something that wasn't beige or grey in a secondhand shop with pink floyd playing (not the early stuff, which is actually really amazing; no, it was the dark side of the moon, i think. i actually tuned it out and am not sure, so it may have been the wall) and rainbow-coloured clerks. a three-quarter length chocolate brown leather and suede coat (secondhand, secondhand). gorgeous, i think.

we completed the consumer tour with a lunch stop at a local organic place (where they photocopied the gluten-free food guide i found at the back of this book) and then a visit to my favourite enviro-local-independent-culture store. i picked up some potting soil for the bookstore.

altogether, it was a lovely day - and i haven't even written about multiple gnomal activities, with dog and cats abounding. or the nearly-brewing thunderstorm as i read wilkie collins on the enclosed porch.

tomorrow i go back to work; today is about spring.