for getting the chance to realize, at my grampa's wake tonight, how little i knew about him. because he talked so little about himself, it's only now that i can get a more complete picture of the man my grandfather was. who knew he'd considered becoming a florist? or that he played the guitar? 

*

for the huge, yellow, just-waning full moon floating in the sky as we drove home. perfect.

for the little things: hard cider. red lipstick. @birdsrightsactivist. 

for hearing c. talking to her people over the baby monitor at naptime. before the end of last week, i hadn't used her monitor for months, but a series of incidents (dry erase marker on the window frames, a bottle of hand sanitizer mysteriously empty) prompted me to want to keep a closer ear on her. "hello, little guy!" she said over and over today, jaunty as any chauffeur. "do you need a ride to the airport? to this airport? or this airport? or this airport?"

*

for this picture of my grampa and me, taken in 1981. until my mother gave it to me yesterday, i'd never seen it. 

*

for my friend a., hairstylist extraordinaire, who came to the house tonight to tutor me in the application of various hair products. 

for having known my grampa, who died early this morning. he carved birds out of wood. he watched mass on tv, explaining each aspect of the liturgy to my young, ignorant, unitarian self. he brought milk chocolate turkeys to thanksgiving dinner. he gave me things he knew i'd love: books he'd read as a child, a box brownie camera, a silver claddaugh ring, the music of john denver. he called me jennifire. i loved him.

for small mercies. for most of the day, i thought that roo had been exposed to pertussis. i also thought this was likely to be my beloved grandfather's last day on earth. but roo wasn't exposed, thank god. and, at least of this writing, my grandfather is alive in hospice care with my grandmother and their four children by his side. i know the end is near for him but i'm glad the end didn't come today.

*

for old navy's vanity sizing, which allows me to appear to wear smaller jeans now than i did before i was pregnant. 

for an afternoon walk. it was only a short hike, the one the three of us took today. but it was a hike through a field thick with fading wildflowers---a field easy to be aimless in, so dense and feral it was easy to forget we were only ever yards from our car. we got a little lost---pleasantly so---among all the asters and thistle and goldenrod, and sat in the deep shade of a giant maple whose leaves were just beginning to turn, and then emerged, blinking, into the sunlight. the perfect outing for the last weekend of summer.

*

for roo, who has been tending toward a slight mania during his bedtime feeding. he likes to pull off the breast now to whisper and grin at me for minutes at a time (dadadadada, he calls softly, reaching up to claw affectionately at my face) before falling abruptly to sleep in my arms.

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for having married someone who agrees that a perfect evening involves hard cider, chocolate chiffon tart, and the miss america pageant. and perfect it was.

for this morning's tupperware brunch. because there's something i really and sincerely love about being (almost) convinced that i should be making all my pasta in the microwave, in a $20 plastic box designed specifically for that (and no other) purpose. about a group of us being called, really and sincerely, "ladies."  

*

for being able to hear the music from the 5 PM mass across the backyard. if i'm lucky and the wind is right (and if there's a gap in the deafening, never-ending parade of motorcycles that roars by all summer long) i can hear the organ being played during the evening service at the church next door, and some faint singing. a privilege, to be able to eavesdrop that way. a holy thing.

*

for listening to audra read food network magazine out loud to herself: "lasagna soup?! ... pies on a stick?! ... pumpkin caramel?! ... oh, man. oh, i would eat the shit out of that."