Sunny Sunday morning

It's sunny so early, and the birds are noisy if the windows are open, which they have been for the last couple nights. It's hard to sleep in, not that I am much good at that anyway! It feels like summer, the kind of summer day when I was a kid and you woke up and had a beautiful day ahead of you, to just get up and wander outside, where we had a lawn that was mowed. 

It's quiet here this morning. Tamara is not often up this early, especially on a Sunday, but it feels different, having her away for the night. She passed her driving test this week and asked to drive to Newton to attend a Rainbow event and stay with her friend JennAnn. It's nice for everybody, although I do miss the energy she has brought. 

Ray and I watched Notting Hill last night, an old movie with Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts that I thought I had seen, but maybe hadn't. It's quite hokey, and I find that really romantic movies sometimes make me sad. I think about my (life-long) relationship and it doesn't quite measure up. Of course, that's because movies are fiction. I feel like my husband doesn't love me that much, or, for that matter, I don't love him that much. It feels a little bit like I've settled for a "good-enough" relationship. But, honestly, many people don't have even that. And maybe it's partly because of movies and books that make you believe in a kind of "true love" that doesn't really exist--or perhaps only rarely. There are some historical examples of people who gave up everything--or their lives--to be with someone else. But maybe that's not the whole story either. 

We went to Molli's yesterday morning and had coffeecake she had just made with D. It was tasty. Then the five of us drove to Saugus Iron Works, a national historic site. It was not open, whether due to COVID or a seasonal schedule. But the grounds were open. It is quite interesting, in the middle of a residential neighborhood, but it used to be in the middle of nowhere. In the 1600s, it was built on a waterway that led to Boston. Now it's silted up and boats could not come. It was sort of a precursor to the Industrial Revolution, "mass producing" nails and pots and other things that had been made by individual blacksmiths one at a time. There is a building that remains from that time and waterwheels. D could run around, Ray could read signs and we all had a lovely time. We'll come back some time when it's open and we can go in the buildings and there will be interpreters. It reminded me of places I went with my parents as a kid, like Louisbourg, and places we took our kids too. Ah, tradition! So glad there are historic places preserved. As a side note, at least one of our ancestors worked there, an indentured servant/prisoner of war Scotsman captured and sent here (instead of them having to feed him in jail or kill him).