Spring, it seems, is finally here. After weeks of cool temps and late-season snowstorms, we seem to have turned a corner. Last week, it was 32. By the end of this week, it will be 85. That’s what happens in Colorado. You go from having the heat on to running the AC in the blink of an eye.
I started thinking about the things I love about summer. BBQs with my boys and their friends is at the top of the list. Good fruits and veggies from the farmers’ markets is another. Vacation. Woo! I’m taking two whole weeks off in July, and I can’t wait.
Here are some other things I love about summer:
Flowers
Those of you who've been following this blog at least since last summer know I love, love, love flowers. I have a very large flower garden out in my front yard that consists of four very large separate flower beds filled with shrub, Bourbon and old English roses, cosmos, columbine, lupine, lavender, herbs (sage, thyme, yarrow), sunflowers, hollyhocks, irises, delphiniums, geraniums, rose mallow, Russian sage, snow-in-summer, butterfly bush, dragon flower, pin cushion flower, daisies, purple coneflower and, yes, much more. (Did I mention the flower beds were big?)
I have several additional beds in back, including what Benjy and I call the Faery Garden, which is pictured above (that's just a few of my rose bushes with King Arthur giant delphinium rising above them next to my back deck).
Summer is the time when I can walk out my door to the scent of sun-warmed roses and lavender. Do I love this? Oh, yes, I do. And thanks to my son Benjy, the garden keeps getting lovelier.
Writing
I have a love-hate relationship with writing. Every time I start a new book, I worry that this book will be the one that everyone hates, the one that proves without a doubt that I’m an idiot who can’t write worth a damn. I know I’m not the only writer who feels this way, but I often suspect I’m the only writer whose suspicions are correct.
When the words are flowing and the pages are coming together and the characters are divulging their inner turmoil without my having to hold a gun to their heads, life is bliss. When I decide (as I always do) that story sucks and I’m an idiot and my characters clam up, life is misery.
Still, I’d rather write fiction that do almost anything, and since I haven’t decided that Natalie and Zach’s story sucks yet, life is good.
Reading
I freaking love to read. If there’s one thing I love more than writing, it might be reading. This summer, I expect to be reading a lot of historical texts about the French and Indian War to bring myself up to 1760, the year Connor’s story is set. Yes, reading texts for research is just as fun for me as reading fiction because the facts and details in the texts aren’t a bunch of dry facts to me; they’re fuel for my imagination, grist for the mill, a shot of caffeine for my muse.
Still, I hope to make some progress through my TBR, focusing on Christy Reece’s books and a handful of other authors.
Season 3 of True Blood
I cannot wait! The bad part is that I have no choice but to wait because I don’t have television, let alone HBO. So I don’t get to watch it when True Blood starts up again this summer. I shall find a way...
Because who can resist Erik and Bill and Sookie and the world’s favorite dumb blond — Jason Stackhouse. This clip had me laughing out loud at work today.
James Frain, fresh from being beheaded as Thomas Cromwell on The Tudors shifts from Showtime to HBO to play... A vampire? I'm not sure from the trailer what he is. But he doesn’t look good for poor Tara. Still, I admire him as an actor and was happy to see him in the cast.
Guys without shirts
It goes without saying, doesn’t it, that one of the best parts of summer is seeing sexy men without shirts in the park, on the street, in their yards — all over the place. In Boulder, which is the sport capitol of a very athletic state, the sightseeing in terms of shirtless men is unparalleled. The temps go up, the clothes come off. And my eyeballs are ready...
What are you looking forward to this summer?