A day to celebrate

If you had asked me yesterday, I would not have told you it was a good thing. But after the intensity of the situation wore off, I realized I felt lighter. More sure of myself. More whole. Can you even imagine, in a weird twist of middle-school fate, I ran into the screaming woman again. On the playground. As I rode up on my bike with my dear friend and her little Peruvian daughter who happens to be Ivy's best friend. Oh, my. As it turns out, my dear friend and the screaming woman know each other. I immediately rode as fast as I could away from there, because I despise confrontation. But as I was riding, I thought "Well, the bully scared me away from the playground, didn't she?" and I rode right back. Unfortunately, my friend thought maybe a formal introduction might help the screaming woman and me get off to a better start. I don't blame her, but I also was not at all interested in talking to the woman. So I said as politely as I possibly could (meaning, I put my fangs away) "I don't really want to talk to you." She then proceeded to bawl me out again. And I won't go into the blow-by-blow, but in the end, she called me closed minded (as if) and I once again told her she was not going to change me. I am still me, I will still be kind, and open, and admire children of all nationalities and cultures. Including caucasian children. Then, having faced the demon (confrontation, that is, I have no illusions that the screaming woman is a demon) I rode away. And it occurred to me this morning that I am glad for that confrontation. I now know that I was not wrong, that she perceived the situation in a completely different way than I did, and that her issue is just that - hers. I have told myself that ad nauseum, but only today do I really feel it in my heart. Thus, thanks to her second berating, which I was somewhat prepared for, I am free of her. But in all honesty? I am still glad we live in different towns. I'm only human.

Now I don't know how much happiness I dare jam into this post, but I'm going to push it a little. My dear friend - we shall just call her D, for dear (as opposed to B who is my best friend? Or T who is my true friend?) - Ahem! Where was I?

D and I are scavengers at heart. Last year I found - on the side of a side road - a wicker set. Chairs. Loveseat. Table, ottomans. I called D as I am not a big fan of wicker. Turns out she been looking for a wicker set going on YEARS. So we stuffed and strapped and slowly bumped all the way to her house with her treasures sticking akimbo out of our cars.

But yesterday it was my turn. Come home to Mama, my pretties!

Can you believe I found these on the side of the road? I have been waiting eons for these. They still have their stickers on the bottom that says Arvin. I think I'm feeling faint. Two of them were originally kind of a Girl Scout green, and one was dark orange. They belonged to a woman named Bertha Colvin. I know because she wrote her name on the underside of each one in permanent marker. It makes me wonder if she brought them to a pot luck or something with her hot dog casserole, maybe? But that idea doesn't quite fly seeing as they weigh about 20 pounds each.

These chairs are definitely staying with me. (As opposed to a lot of other junk I have plans for, which will eventually, hopefully, be exchanged for some green currency.)

These girls have a friend already. I found her on the side of the road as well. Not close enough to the road to be obviously free, but kind of in the brush and nowhere near where someone would like to sit and relax. After debating with myself for a few long moments, I decided she really needed to come home with me.

You can see why, can't you? So in a fit of bravery, I went around back ('cause that's the way we do it in Maine) and found the woman of the house tending her chickens. Okay, maybe that part is made up, but it looks nice in my  memory. She came out of the house and I asked her if she was trying to get rid of the chair. She told me that it had belonged to her mother-in-law and that a few years ago her husband had decided to toss it. Thankfully, she was inspired to save it from its imminent demise by setting it out front with a scarecrow in it. I expressed my (admittedly small) concern that her scarecrow wouldn't have a place to sit this autumn, but she assured me she didn't bother to put one out anymore. So this chair has literally been sitting there waiting for me. It had ivy crawling up it, and it took some serious muscle to wrench the chair from its tendrilled grasp. This lovely creature is also going to stay home with me.

I'm not sure stylistically the chairs all go together, but I'm going to think on it some to see if I can get them to harmonize. I don't like or need things to be matchy-matchy. I would say it is time for me to build a covered porch. Don't you agree? Ha. Don't tell my husband I said that.