A Peaceful Day

Yesterday was a rest day after our race on Saturday.  We went to the Methodist Church and heard another excellent sermon from Powell Osteen.  And then, since it was a rainy day, we drove up to Emerald Isle to see The Shape of Water, a film that has been on my short list for some time.  What a strange and wonderful film to see!  I dreamed about it all night and thought about it all day.

Rex Reed in The Observer called it "a lunkheaded load of drivel,"  but the reliable Anthony Lane of The New Yorker had said, "The strangest thing about The Shape of Water, which should be one almighty mess, is that it succeeds."  I'm on the Anthony Lane side.  When we got out of the movie theater it was getting dark, and it was absolutely pouring rain (fittingly, because that is how the movie ends), and the rain continued off and on during the 30-minute drive home.

But what a dramatic change this morning!  The sky was cloudless and the temperature was perfect, winds light and variable (as they say out here) from the west.  We both ran to Fort Macon again, five miles, and both of us felt strong and sure; I kept marveling that I had run a 5-K only two days ago.  Coveys of little birds kept flying into the air, the ones with golden wings, which I have discovered in my reading are pine warblers.

We went out to the dune-top deck after lunch to soak up some sun, and met our neighbors upstairs, a man and woman from Kentucky.  We had met them briefly last week in the elevator; their grand-daughter Brook had been spotted Saturday tumbling and back-flipping out on the grass behind the condo doing an amazing gymnastics floor routine, equal (to my untrained eye) to an Olympics performance.  I had spoken to her at the time; "That was awesome."  She smiled shyly.  "I ran ten miles this morning," I told her, "but I would trade that in a heartbeat to be able to do just one back-flip."

Shopping day and errand day.  Last week, I had broken the zipper on my favorite pair of North Face pants, and after a short search on the internet I had come upon Miss Jessie's Sewing Center on Arendell.  I had dropped them off on Friday and today I picked them up and chatted a little with Patty, the new owner of Miss Jessie's.  "How long have you been here?" I asked her.  "I bought the business from Miss Jessie in 2015," she said.  "Miss Jessie had this business for 32 years; she was still sewing when she was 89 years old!  A week after she sold it to me she passed on."  I pointed to an old Singer sewing machine on the table.  "Did you use that to put in this zipper?"  "Yes," she replied.  "It's more than a hundred years old.  They put that pulley and motor on there; it used to be a treadle machine."

I remember my Mom had one just like it.  What a wonder Miss Patty is!  I could have talked to her all day.  I wonder if she will be here when she is 89 years old, taking pride in her humble work, replacing broken zippers for visitors on a sewing machine that was made in another century.

Dinner was roasted brussel sprouts, kidney beans, and leftover shrimp and crab casserole from Friendly Market.  And another gorgeous sunset.  It has been a peaceful day.