One of the great things about living where I live and how I live is that I can go out on my deck, stark naked at 8 o'clock at night and bang two dog dishes together really loudly for as long as I want to to call in the brown girls. No one cares that I'm naked and no one cares how much noise I make. Plus, that's a real sign of spring: I'm outside at night, in bare feet and bareass and its NOT THAT COLD. Of course, 40 isn't exactly warm, but I was barefoot on my deck and there was no snow. Miracle of miracles. And of course the dogs came running up the driveway, as they always do when they hear metal on metal. They are really cute when they come running side by side like that, like a team of horses.

And mud season has arrived. I won't be driving to the house for a while. I almost got stuck last night when I got home from work, got buried well into my tires by the house. There's still snow in the yard and the woods, but the driveway is thawing. Huge mud wallow in front of the house and at the bottom of the driveway. So I hauled out my Wellies and slogged on down this morning, inhaling the dampness of the snow melting. I love the smell of early spring but it's really hard on my asthma. Good over bad, though, I enjoy it enough to overcome the wheezing. Scissors cut paper.

I think Ken and I have reached the saturation point with each other. We have run out of things to say. We sit in silence for part of the evening. I'm tapped, completely tapped. We recount the events of the day (how much can I say about which audio books I cataloged for Saranac Lake?), talk about the pope's feeding tube and Terry Schiavo, still alive. I did finally ask him why it would be all right to remove HIS feeding tube if he were in her state (Fla.)(no, vegetative) but it's not all right to remove hers. He said I was right, there is no difference between the two situations. Tonight I expect to hear more on this, he will mull it over all day in his solitude.

This weekend we turn our clocks ahead to what Ken calls "Fast Time." I can't believe how light it will be, since it's already light until nearly 7 o'clock now. It seems that spring is coming really quickly. Ken saw a chipmunk already, and it's really early. The lake is getting dark, which means the ice is getting thinner. The sun is high in the sky and warm, very warm. I don't have a fire every night (although it does get cold in the living room, I admit--I'm just really tired of building fires). The dogs have wanderlust. If I let him, Jackson disappears for hours every night. Last night I walked him on a leash twice when he needed to pee and poop. He thought that was really, really queer, but he made his potty like a good boy.

And of course Henry is always in my thoughts. Driving to and from work I think back to last year, what he was going through, what we were all going through. It was awful, and who could believe that he would die. Not my brother, so full of life and so determined in all he did. There are so many times when I still can't believe he's dead, when he's so alive to me. What an amazing person he really was.