Rare Days

James Russell Lowell spoke of them so eloquently, rare days in June, perfect days. And this entire weekend has been perfect, weatherwise at least. Upper seventies for temperature, light breezes, sunny skies with high, friendly clouds. I've finally had to water my deck pots! We've had several days in a row with no significant rain. Which also means the sump pump has stopped cycling every few minutes as it has for nearly two solid weeks. That means the water table has reverted to normal and until rain sets in again, I can rest easy at night without nightmares of a flooded basement. Other signs of summer include the fact that we are smack in the middle of strawberry season. Friday afternoon I purchased a four pound pack of enormous, gorgeous, fragrant fresh strawberries. Between the 16yo and me we polished them off in just over 24 hours. Mmmm. They're just a memory now and I'm happy to report they came in a recyclable container. I have a few summer projects to accomplish around the house. Most of them involve long overdue cleaning and organizing of much neglected corners. Last summer when I painted nearly all the interior of the house I had a tendency to clean as I went. As a room was painted, only appropriate items were returned to the newly freshened space. Which means a tremendous amount of displaced stuff ended up just getting pushed and poked into the couple of rooms that didn't get painted. So I've been very productive with restoring these spaces to order. One of these spaces is my younger son's bedroom. Which I have allowed him to neglect for much too long. Various corners of the room have been cleaned, organized, dusted and vacuumed at one time or another over the last two years, but the entire room, I am chagrined to admit, has not been completely cleaned for more than that long. So far the cleaning of his room has been pretty manageable, we seem to agree for the most part on what must go and what can be kept. If an item is to be kept, a place must be expressly designated for it to be. And the middle of the floor doesn't count as a proper storage space. Not any more, anyway. And it's difficult to focus on indoor cleaning projects when a rare June day is unfolding outside. Good thing we have two more months. I have a feeling it will take at least that long.