Hallelujah!

Today the keeper was celebrating her 60th birthday! To tell you the truth, she has been celebrating for several weeks now, but she finished it off with a dinner at her favorite Pomadoro with W and J, her dear friends. It was a lovely, lush, tastier than usual meal that ended with Tiramisu and a candle. She said it was a perfect ending to the first day of a new decade.

As well, today she assembled a Garden Cart with those "E-Z"( Extremely -Zonking) assembly directions! She was determined to figure it out, and was outside for several hours learning how to use a sprocket wrench, and would reward herself with popsicles every few bolts she secured! But she triumphed and now we have a garden wagon to lug up to 400 lbs ( that is a lot of cats or cat food).

We also met our new handyman named Jim who is going to become part of the household, most likely, given all the projects she has for him. But he is allergic to cats, we found out. Guess the projects will be outdoors.

The heat hasn't left but I let the keeper dress me in a very useful cooling garment--a kerchief soaked in water. I wore it around the house and outside all day, and when it dried, she soaked it again for me. She said I looked like a racehorse in a cooling sheet.

The keeper's friend S reminded her of a lovely poem from Mary Oliver called "Halleluiah" from Evidence:

"And have you too been trudging . . . sometimes

almost forgetting how wondrous the world is

and how miraculously kind some people can be?

And have you too decided that probably nothing important

is ever easy?

Not, say, for the first sixty years.

Halleluiah, I'm sixty now, and even a little more,

and some days I feel I have wings."

The keeper says she is grateful for the embarrasment of wonders and kindnesses all these years.