This tree is dead, the one in my back yard is not. I couldn’t do anything to protect that one, but I can for this one. The Imperial Honey Locust near my house is almost certainly older than the gigantic silver maple by where I lived on Locust Street. 

The house used to be green, now it’s a sort of lilac color. I don’t like it much. 

I was cutting the siding of my house, the one in plainfield, and beneath the blue I found red. I’m glad my house isn’t red. I don’t intend to paint it any other color, and I suppose that has nothing to do with lasers, as much as I love that conspiracy theory. 

There are places that need blue paint, on the south side and on the east, it could use a few patches high up where I might have to use a ladder, and down low where I ought to replace a board or two. 

I love this house. In the winter it feels like a ship sailing through fog, and in the summer it feels like a low valley, surrounded by trees. 

More than maintenance the work we’re doing to the old woodshop feels real good. It’s the first serious change we’re making to this house, to any place we’ve ever lived in, and it’s been hugely educational. Both in terms of how framing and drywalling and rennovation more generally work technically, but emotionally as well. The work has been difficult.

Moments of calm between tending to Roby or work are instantly filled with the unromantic business of drywalling or tidying up or moving insulation. We have a deadline that we’re absolutely going to miss, but I’d still like to get somewhat close to our aspirations, and it has to get done anyways. The sooner the better.

Had the rush and the amount of work been allowed to overwhelm us it would have done so weeks ago. There’s no room for that, and that’s a good thing. 

I wonder if we’ll stop once the apartment’s done. The frenetic demand of work with a deadline and such a clear goal makes the work easy to pick up at a moment’s notice. It’s not as though there’s a shortage of things to do. 

1. A fence for the garden
   
2. Extending the barn roof to keep the cherry dry
   
3. A tent platform for big rock
   
4. A sauna for big rock
   
5. A sauna for the pasture
   
6. Magic attic

I could work on these things with just as much fervor as I’ve brought to finishing this apartment and it would still take me three summers...maybe...

I guess we’ll see, won’t we.