Saturday, April 4, 2020

9:22 a.m.

There are so many birds in my neighborhood.

So much chirping and flying and flittering about.

I never really noticed it until this morning. Or rather, I recognized how much I’ve noticed it lately. Especially when I saw that bluejay on my front porch an hour ago. I never see bluejays around here.

While there is still some traffic in Bremerton, given I live on one of the busiest streets, it is significantly quieter in the morning and evening. Hence, I can hear the birds more. It’s odd to hear nothing in Bremerton but birds.

It’s now getting to a point where the traffic noise is quite disruptive to my bird listening skills.

Save for one day, it’s been officially three weeks I’ve been working from home. Some of those weeks are interrupted by three or four day periods of being in Port Townsend, so I have the fortune of being able to break up my time with which walls I stare at daily.

I can’t say this event getting to me yet. I’m slowly figuring out my routine, including which places within walking distance I can still get a sandwich for lunch so to help them out as well as give my eyes and legs a break from staring at work and virus news.

Maybe I’m more of an introvert than I thought. I know for sure I have both qualities. When I start to go down a dark rabbit hole, I realize it’s because I haven’t been around people. And people energize me, not drain me.

The Kitsap Food Co-op has started a curb side pick up service, which I gladly utilize once a week, so that eliminates my need to go out into potentially crowded places.

I went on a run this week where I “visited” my friends in Manette calling it a “run by.” I stood on their sidewalk while they stood on their porch and we chatted, not unlike if I went in their house for a beer. That was a delightful experiment and I plan on doing it weekly between Manette and Union Hill, with a couple side trips here and there.

I decided to stay in Bremerton this weekend, as my backyard is starting to become a jungle and it’s that time of year when my regular weeding schedule starts for the year, starting with the first big weed out right now.

Eventually, I’d love to get some clean dirt into the vegetable beds again and grow some simple things this year – cherry tomatoes, sugar snap peas, kale, carrots, any vegetables the boys want. Even weed out Jeremy’s unused raised beds in PT and get some stuff going there too.

I woke up this morning with a little bit of restlessness (and surprisingly not hungover after a successful evening of Zooming with friends and games with a few glasses of wine – I attribute my unexpected perky disposition this morning to the excellent quality of wine imbibed last night, compared to the night before, where the quality of wine was meh and I felt terrible yesterday morning so my theory stands that one really should just drink excellent wine regularly––)

I debated between a long run at Uelands (the one place with trails that are still open and has good social distancing qualities because they’re all mostly logging roads) or get cracking on the yardwork. I convinced Jeremy to run with me tomorrow, so that helped lighten today’s schedule.

But then I sat down and listened to Scott Simon on NPR and his essay about his observations from his run this week. He was seeing all the essential workers in his town doing what they’re doing to keep everyone safe and moving forward and helping maintain some semblance of a routine.

And so that got me thinking about my town. And its state of being. And how quiet it is. And how I can hear the birds chirping.

And nothing else.