Sunday In The Park: Part 2

(NOTE: Read "Part 1" below, first!)

Sundays usually bring us four hours or so away from the cottage. With an hour's round trip to church at 10 am, we try to incorporate other stops over in Scotts Valley on our way to or from Mass. (The Episcopal sermons are a good bit lengthier than the usual Roman Catholic, so services are usually an hour and a half, or so. We don't mind, as our Pastor Mary Blessing is a really fine preacher, especially when she does a children's homily once a month, as on August 2nd). Today as we were leaving, we picked up a loaf of outrageously good Arcangeli Ciabatta bread - famous in this part of California, baked daily in a little fishing town up the coast – from the greengrocer's stand next to the church; and we stopped off for lunch at a Cambodian fast-food cafe nearby (chicken lemongrass soup with Kaffir lime leaves; spicy minced meat/cabbage-leaf wraps – on their shady, quiet patio).

We spent most of the afternoon on our back deck; John made lists (I can't stop him!) and I did a manicure and some light reading – and watched the little flowers I'd just set out on the baker's rack, as they danced in the summer breeze. And I thanked God for all the beauty that surrounds us here.

After listening to a Garrison Keillor program on Lake Wobegon Lutherans – lots of lovely hymns! – we ate a light supper (Insalata Caprese and a bit of that good loaf we'd bought earlier) and were off to read and to sleep, perchance to dream.