Recommended reading

I love Beth Cherry's blog, Not Dead Yet. She is an eloquent, funny, understated writer who, unfortunately for her readers, does not archive her posts. So just in case you do not get to her latest entry before it disappears forever, I will quote her so you can see why she's so wonderful:

It was the kind of weekend that had small memorable moments: the first time in the year when you take notice of the way the water smells coming out of the gardenhose, the smell of sunblock, the click of flipflops, the feel of dark, damp dirt falling through your fingers into the terracotta pots, the shade of the wide-brimmed hat across your face.

We celebrated the end of all of our work on Sunday at sunset with champagne and chocolate chip oatmeal cookies and watched the sun disappear behind the climbing rose whose branches we tied to the latticework with strips of pantyhose like a virgin in wait for the kraken.

"They're a bunch of women," my roommate grumbled, "Take care of me, Bryant. Feed me, Bryant. Give me all of your money, Bryant. Keep the bugs off of me, Bryant."

"You love them," I said.

"I do," he said.