Bright early mornings, crisp evenings and a cat on a blanket

by Nora

The last two days Little Miss 2 was down with a stupid flu and stayed at home. Mixed feelings at Cherry Frog’s pond. The sick Miss, a bit worried about staying behind on lessons, was calling her mates to arrange school practicalities. Miss no 1, furious because it wasn’t her who was sick so that she could miss school, was hugging the sick sister (no, no, love is not the asnwer) in a desperate hope to catch the virus… Oh well. For me, apart from technical disturbancies of a daily routine which is heavily dependant on kids’ programs (main disturbancy being that I had to miss my own pilates lesson) no harm was done. On the contrary.

One sick kid means one school run less. And this means some precious early morning me-time. Enough to walk around the neighborhood, look at the sky above, look at the flowers down low and wake myself up the proper way.

It’s still cold in the mornings, with temperatures around 10 Celcius; However, it’s definitely spring. Officially. Heartwarmingly. All the usual stuff- breathe deep, take pictures, butterflies in stomach, flying thoughts of past years, holidays, loves. All that just because it’s spring. It’s a solid good reason, isn’t it?

I took a different route back home after leaving Miss no 1 to the safe hands of the school bus driver, I had no need to rush. The neighbourhood was quiet, cars absent, I’ve just met some folks walking to the metro station nearby. On my way, splendid mimosa trees full of yellow flowers tore the dryness of cement buildings apart.

An unbuilt piece of land- you cannot see many unbuilt plots around- is full of black mustard flowers; I remember my dad telling me that when black mustards are blooming, you cannot eat them- you have to wait until the flowers die. But then… oh my, have you tried black mustard? You cut the green part of the plant, put it in boiling water for a couple of minutes, drain it, sprinkle it with olive oil and lemon, add salt and voila! The best spring salad is in front of you. As much as I love its yellow grandeur, I cannot wait until it’s time to eat them!

Walking in the middle of the yellow mustard flower rug, one could spot some humble chamomile and a beautiful purple little flower. And my distressed boots as you may see, eternal love 😉

By the end of the walk, I couldn’t help but turn my head upwards and stare the young pine trees, planted by some neighbours some time ago. At this point of time each year, their branches are full of pine needles (obviously!) and… to the greatest dismay of Little Miss no 2, caterpillar nests! Yuck! Each time she sees them, she starts saying the same story, over and over: “I will never forget the day that I was playing at the school yard and suddenly a caterpillar landed from the pine tree to my shoulder, mum, it was horrible, I was terrified, I’m telling you, I hate them! And the day after, this older boy crunched one between his own teeth, he simply put it in his mouth, do you believe this? I hate them!”

It will not be long till such crawling creatures land on our cobblestone and I need to get prepared to listen the story above for the umpteenth time…

With a big leap from early morning to the afternoon (inbetween it’s just me at my office, nothing interesting to share, see what I mean), we visited my mum, who lives downtown, in one of the few city centre houses with a garden. Small as it may be, it’s still a garden, with lemon and bitter orange trees and flowers and stray cats which find a refuge in there, protected by the city traffic. A beautiful house (remember the song of Crosby Stills Nash & Young “our house is a very very very fine house, with two cats in the yard, life used to be so hard, now everything is easy cause of you”? Exactly this). The fire was lit, my Last Dance on the Beach blanket, present for my mum, covering the nearby armchair and Nana, the cat that has the exact same age as Little Miss no 1, old for a cat by now, was sitting on it. With an obvious delight.

Yes, that’s a picture and a feeling to keep me smiling during the boring part of life: Family, fireplace, crochet blanket and a lazy fat cat. What’s not to love?