This is going to sound weird, but I love all the little physical interactions I have with the house everyday. Waking up in the morning, walking downstairs (my heart leaps at the thought of stairs) and opening the kitchen blinds. If it's sunny I open the door between the kitchen and the porch to catch the light and warm air from the rising sun. After coffee is set in motion I make my way through the rooms. Open curtains always and windows weather permitting. And then in the evening reversing it.
The beauty of this place flat out floors me. Aside from a little morning "rush hour" with folks leaving for work and people coming to drop off their kids at the schools down the street , this place is remarkably quiet. What my friend Jim would have have termed "pathologically mellow" 15 years ago. People walk by with dogs and babies and friends. Some jog by and others bike by. The sun is shining. The field across the street is really greening up and the birds are singing. If I burst into song it would be quite a Disney moment.
Rachel started school today. Her teacher seems great and so does basically everyone else I've dealt with at the school. They have the desks in groups of four students in her classroom, the same as in Japan. Everyone shares school supplies, no need to bring your own. What a change from the micromanagement of Japanese school and the "5 pencils with pencil caps, two erasers, 12 color craypas, one shitajiki (does anyone have a neat description for that?) and the right kind of pencil case, ideally all coordinated in a Sanrio character motif" situation. And you wonder why people in Japan become shinkeishitsu (tempermentally nervous). No school uniform here and nh is a pretty casual place so the de facto uniform is t-shirts, jeans and sneakers. Hey, that's my de facto uniform too!
I fulfilled my lawn care obligation this morning. Now I think I'm going to go see about all those flower seeds I bought yesterday.