We are entering summer’s dog days.  I did a post like this last month and really enjoyed the exercise of recalling the particular moments of my life.  I do share details like this regularly on Instagram, also. 

Matt and I went to a lovely dinner to mark the summer solstice, on June 21st.  It was a glorious, perfect evening and I tried not to let my enjoyment of it be clouded by my awareness that we are now turning back towards the dark.  I succeeded in part.

Whit spent a few hours at his desk in June, though more hours in a rowing shell and on Fortnite.

The weekend of June 23rd was downright cold in Marion.  We had a lovely, quiet weekend the four of us, which included this after-dinner walk to visit Little Brea.

The week of July Fourth found us all with my mother, including my sister and her family.  We celebrated Mum’s birthday, as we always do.  It was intensely bittersweet, sometimes more bitter than sweet, but it was beautiful at the same time.  I’m constantly amazed by how memory works: already the difficulty and heat and irritation are fading in my memory, and the joyful moments are becoming stronger.  I’m grateful that this is how time works.  We went for walks after dinner each night.  This is the four cousins on one such walk.  

We watched fireworks together at dusk on July Fourth.  Buggy.  Bittersweet (remember all the years we did this with Dad). Beautiful (the fireworks were lovely).

There were some glorious skies during our after-dinner walks.  This is on July 6th, as we stood listening to the music played by local volunteers.  When they played What a Wonderful World, there were some glassy eyes, but we were together.