forgiveness and super glue

So six months into marriage, we're learning a lot about conflict, forgiveness, and super glue. I'm a big fan of the "angels without faces" (willowtree) and have a few of them decorating windowsills and shelves around the house. Peter is really into practicality and as he watched me add little decorative things here and there, he commented that he really appreciated things that served a purpose or could be used for something more than decoration. So I picked up one of the angel figures and stated that they served the purpose of bringing me sanity. He raised an eyebrow, but accepted it. I think. Curiously, a few of them were knocked off of their sills and shelves and broken. Unfortunately they were the ones that had been given as gifts. Just things, right? We're learning.
Then we were in an antique store in New Orleans one afternoon. As we dug through the various items in search of "treasure," Peter came across something really neat. A stein commemorating the 500th anniversary of Columbus discovering Puerto Rico. Satisfied that he had found something rare and important to his culture and life, we bought it and moved on to other stores. Later on were loading our bags into the car and the bag containing this treasure slipped from my grip. Really. It had to be that bag. More discussion about things and forgiveness. And then we bought super glue. A lot of it. As we begin to put things back together, I think we both smile as we see growth.

The neighborhood dog co-op

 

Delaney has been settling into Mississippi life. For a while recently she would pace and whine and act pretty unsettled, but now she has apparently found a new routine. We have been dog-sitting her friend Rocky quite a bit, and the two of them enjoy being outside. Delaney likes to chase the squirrels and swim in the brackish bay water in the canal behind our house. But lately she and Rocky have been disappearing for a couple hours at a time. One evening Rocky came home wearing a purple Mardi Gras necklace. After chatting with our neighbor, we discovered that the dogs have been visiting her house and playing with her lab and her two small children. We had a good laugh, and now the dogs go back and forth, visiting the neighbor's house and their dog visiting ours, playing in which ever yard has the better toys that day. Too funny. A few times I have seen Daisy, the lab mix that belongs to our neighbor on the other side jump the fence to join them. I think Delaney still misses her jungle, the iguanas, and her dog friends in Luquillo, but she seems to be doing alright with her new group of play buddies. : )

Delaney, Rocky, and Duke

Weekend in New Orleans

A few weekends ago we drove over to New Orleans to visit with our friend Steve (and Rocky). While Rocky and Delaney caught up, Steve took Peter and I out to a Mediterranean restaurant, and then to a jazz lounge where we enjoyed live music until it was past my bedtime. The next day we roamed through a few local farmers' markets where we enjoyed more live music and local foods. My lunch was an alligator po boy sandwich. We ended the day with Les Mis (first a live performance by Steve, as we listened to the sound track and he explained the story and the themes of redemption, etc.) then with the movie, which we thought was excellent. My husband hasn't stopped singing some of those songs since. Thanks for the great weekend, Steve!