IMG_6815 Pity Party Central here. B.B. King is wailing about the “Stormy Monday Blues,”  and as much as I like B.B. King, Bobby Bland does that particular song better. The sky is overcast and gray, as it has been for several days,  the wind is still blowing, the temperature is 40 damp degrees, and I just finished wading through the March issue of Vogue magazine, just a few pages short of matching the thickness of an unabridged dictionary, lusting after gorgeous shoes that I can’t afford, have no place to wear, and would feel foolish clomping about in anyway, reading about the rich and famous, cynically yet enviously reading articles written by people who seem to have such insight and worldly understanding of the human condition, not to mention smooth writing skills and good vocabulary, all the while wondering if their lives really are any more meaningful than mine. IMG_6813 So Mari and I wander outside in the mist in an attempt to shake our cabin fever and hope we can find answers to the meaning of life. I had to admit the gloomy weather at least brought a modicum of moisture that we severely need. And the rocks are actually prettier when they are wet from the drizzle. IMG_6824 IMG_6826 I also realize that I am much more at home clomping around in my tennis shoes taking pictures with my canine companion than I would be tottering around in overpriced heels at some vapid society social trying to think up something philosophical to say to some plastic person I had just met. IMG_6817 And then, there it was, peering at us quietly through the gray fog, a sign that, indeed, things would get better. A bunch of yellow daffodils had managed to bloom despite the wind and cold and drought. We came back into a warm house to all the comforts we could possibly want and more probably than we needed, and it hit me that I was, like most of us, pretty much where I am supposed to be, and have been doing pretty much what I was meant to be doing all along. Now it was Etta James singing the blues, and like what happens in most cases when listening to the blues, the blues seem to float away on the notes someone else sings, and contentment takes their place. IMG_6823 And just as sure as that old sun will come up in the morning, I know that things always look better in the sunrise and the promise of a new day.