The first day of spring was awesome as advertised. It made it up to 70 for the first time in months. I don’t know for sure, but I don’t believe we have had a day this warm since November. Maybe we have, but I was out of town, so for me this is great. I got up this morning and made breakfast and coffee (really a Latte). After it warmed up a little, I got out back and started spreading pine straw. I didn’t count the number of bales I used, but I spread straw for three hours. I finished the back yard and did a little on one side of the house. I still have a little to do, but three hours was enough. I have to admit, it does look a lot better, and it really wasn’t that hard physically. It was just time consuming. While I worked, I listened to Pandora Radio on my iPhone. Pandora is amazing. You choose what type of music you want to listen to, and then it just selects songs of that genre. I love it. It’s the only place I can go and hear 60’s folk music. I can listen to artist like Peter, Paul and Mary; The Kingston Trio; Bob Dylan; Arlo Guthrie; plus James Taylor; the Beetles; Gordon Lightfoot. These are people I grew up with in the early 60’s and 70’s. Anyway it made the time pass faster.
I said the work wasn’t hard physically, but it was hard. I was reminded of Julia so much as I worked in the back. Just being out there by myself was so odd. She was always out there with me, doing something. I might be spreading all the straw, but she would be pulling weeds or something. She loved working in the yard, so it really got hard a couple of times when I was thinking of her. It’s like I could just turn around and she would be there, but she wasn’t. I realized that this was the reason I had been dreading putting the straw out. I was looking at our outside swing that I had bought for her for Mother’s Day last year. We really enjoyed using it over the summer on late afternoons. We were so looking forward to sitting in it together again this summer. It looks awfully lonely now. I kept seeing plants that we had planted together and memories kept flooding into my mind. It was really hard. But by the end, things were OK. I will still enjoy the swing; I’ll just have to have people over to swing in it.
After I finished working with the pine straw, I went for an hour long run. It was great, almost hot. It really felt good to run in shorts and a short sleeve shirt for a change. I know it’s going to rain and get colder tomorrow and Monday, but the good news is it will warm back up. Winter is broken. It might try to come back, but It can only last a couple of days. The promise of summer, of green grass and flowers is in the air. That makes it all better. Well tomorrow after I get home from work and church I have to register for the Peachtree Road Race. The registration is online starting at 1PM. This is a special Peachtree Race for me. It will be my 30th. I started running them in 1980. I have run everyone since except the 1988 race. I was Youth Camp Director that year and I didn’t feel that I could leave camp to run the race. So this will be number 30. Julia and I were going to celebrate. My sister is going to run with me, and maybe Lisa if she is up. It will be a fun time for the family.
Tonight we went to a concert really worship, at RiverStone. It was John Mark McMillan and Daniel Bashta. It was great. I saw a number of people from Bethel there. I was lost in worship, but I also new that Julia is somewhere in Heaven lost in worship. I am so glad that we had Daniel do the Roar like a Lion song at her service. I love to worship to it, and it is even more special to me now. When he was doing it, I could almost feel her beside me worshiping. Who knows, maybe she was. Anyway I think that this is a good place for me to close. I have to get up in 4 hours, so I need to get some sleep.
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