Playing Catch-Up

           The summer is passing in frenzy now that I am back in Jacksonville.  I have been playing catch up on all the things that fell by the wayside while I played hooky from real-life for the past three weeks, things like cleaning and answering mail and sorting out my inbox.  I have finally gotten things back to the way I like them, orderly, and I am sitting down to think about the past week of events. 

            I brought my cousin to Jax for her birthday weekend.  She got in my car on Thursday afternoon a 15-year-old and she got out Sunday morning a 16-year-old.  We had a weekend full of adventures from a beach day to movie nights and shopping ‘til we literally dropped onto the couch and didn’t move for seven hours. 

            I had the chance to catch up with friends I hadn’t seen in (in one case eight months) a while.  There have been dinner dates and lawn chats and beach banter; all the things necessary to make time disappear.  And that is precisely what it has been doing.  Summer is waning.  My routine-filled days are looming ever nearer, and, honestly, for the first time I am not sad about it.  I am ready for it, almost looking forward to it.  For the first time in a long time I feel settled.  Like life is what it should be, and fall is only going to add to its goodness.  And that’s a feeling I’d like to hold onto for a while.