End of Summer Watermelon Cocktail

and a clean house

My house is clean.

A folded blanket hangs haphazardly over the arm and seat of my couch. A chair sits in the middle of the living room. This is not its normal space of habitation, but it reminds me of the friend who sat there two nights ago and sipped wine and laughed. So, I don’t mind.

An inventory of Annie’s toys: her outdoor frisbee, which she brought inside joyously, defiantly; her “gourd,” a chewed up green and purple contraption that rolls back and forth distributing her kibble piece by piece as she plays with it, into which we put most of her food because she finds just eating out of a bowl to be boring; Santa, a soft rubber toy shaped like that minor Christmas god, which makes a sound like a goose when she chews on it; her food and water bowls (mismatched); her “little girl bed,” which is for napping and is in contrast to her “big girl bed,” which we keep in our bedroom in a vain attempt to get her to sleep on that instead of in between us on our bed (we have an unspoken agreement to not discuss the futility and mindless optimism of her “big girl bed,” which she almost never sleeps on); Ladybug, a vaguely lady bug shaped squeaky toy that has a flap that hangs off of it decorated as the wings. All of these sit strewn about my living room.

Annie not sleeping in her own, very nice and soft bed.