Our Portland spring keeps turning out more flowers, and I just can’t keep up!
The chestnut blooms are about six inches tall and smelling sweet.
As the daffodils and hyacinths fade a bit, the tulips have come up. Giant red ones…
and tiny yellow ones.
Wisteria blooms are climbing all over front porches, smelling sweet as candy.
And every tiny yard is edged with the fallen peels of cherry trees, drifting like soft pink snow.
Spring always feels extra-exuberant in Portland, maybe because every single living thing is so grateful for the warmth and sunshine after our damp, chilly winters.
This week is Passover, when we usually have a dinner with family to celebrate being together after all the hard times Jewish people have been through. This year we are staying apart and remembering, instead.
But the day started with little things. Dear Auntie Bridgett trimmed my hair, and Grandpa Nelson’s, because we were getting very shaggy. She has a good eye and did a nice job!
A new artist in the neighborhood!
Then I finished the masks I promised to friends in Salinas and we all walked to the Postal Annex to send them off. We are getting used to putting on masks every time we leave the house, though I will be glad when they are no longer needed. They steam up my glasses! Still, it was an incredibly beautiful Spring day, and the art and flowers were blooming.
Back home, we sat out on the balcony to rest and read, listening to conversations of dog walkers and folks going out for some take out pizza. We walked down to Rendezvous off Belmont to pick up some take out Manti and Poke…both yummy, even without Nour’s good company and ambiance.
Rendezvous, when we could sit inside
Auntie Katie texted us to arrange a Seder via Skype. She would do her two hours of deliveries from Books with Pictures while the lamb cooked in the slow cooker, then give us a call. We set up candles, wine, and matzoh on the table, along with Grandpa Nelson’s laptop computer.
Second night Seder… long distance style
It worked! We were all able to see and hear each other, read the same Haggadah, and enjoy being silly with each other. We even got to watch the cousins hunt for and find the Afikomen, and negotiate for its return. Their price? A pillow fight! It was clearly time to end the Skype and let the feathers fly … over there.
Dinner with the family!
Having to stay separate to stay safe is weird. It feels like the usual reaction to stress is to huddle together with all your people, but here we are, miles apart on purpose. But different problems call for different solutions, I guess.
Auntie Katie, realizing she has just agreed to a pillow fight
Dear Liza 