Home, Music, Nature

These Are the Days

60 Comments

This morning Clif said, “My underwear is in the mailbox.”

My first thought: What a place for underwear!

But this is life during the time of the coronavirus: Underwear in the mailbox because we don’t want to go to Target. Instead, we have been ordering online the necessities of life.

In the days before the coronavirus, we ordered online maybe five or six times a year. Now, it’s about five times a fortnight. I wonder how it will be when this is all over. Will we go back to shopping the way we did before?

Or, will this new habit of online ordering become a trend? It’s hard for me to predict. However, after a year or a year and a half of doing something, it could become permanent. We shall see.

In other groundbreaking news…Because Clif is still recovering from his sprained ankle, I hefted the round table up the bulkhead stairs from the cellar and onto the patio. Although my knees did not thank me when I was done, what a sight for sore eyes to see the table on the patio.

Soon it will be warm enough to have a glass of something nice as we sit on the patio.

After cleaning the table and taking pictures to celebrate the arrival of the table on the patio, I poked around a bit and discovered the that the ferns have begun to unfurl.

By the basement, where it’s warm.

But even a little farther away, in the leaves.

Despite having underwear in the mailbox, despite covid-19, despite the isolation and confinement, spring has arrived. The trees are in blossom, the ferns are coming up. As Natalie Merchant so beautifully sings, these are the days.

 

60 thoughts on “These Are the Days”

  1. So many strange things to get used to.
    I too wonder how things will have changed for ever. I would love to think that all the countries debts are going to be wiped out and we can start afresh with a more intelligent way of playing with energetic exchange and Capitalism will have had its day ………. one can dream ………. imagine there’s no …….. tra la la …..

    Lovely song – thanks for the introduction – these are the days!

      1. My “lullaby” to my Lauren was “Verdi Cries.” I am a big fan. But I never thought of the relevance of this song to today’s issues. Nice!

  3. We are ordering much more online these days & I’m enjoying not going to the shops as much … I think we’ll keep some of the online shopping post CV 19. Lovely to see spring coming and much more time on the patio..👏👏

  7. Know what you mean about shopping. I’m not keen on online ordering as our house is difficult to find plus browsing is fun and keeps the high street and city centres alive.

  12. There are many things I’ve said lately that I never imagined saying. Recently I texted to a wrong number that I needed to get worms for the dragon and then go by and pick up the Van Gogh. The (wrong) recipient must have thought I was using coded language! It really was (meal)worms for the bearded dragon [pet] and trading a Van Gogh jigsaw puzzle with a friend. These are strange times indeed.

  13. Hi, Laurie – I’m the same as you regarding online orders. Pre-Covid, I had only a few orders per year. Now I have a few orders every single month. I still prefer inperson shopping, but I don’t see that happening for me for quite awhile.

  14. As you know I try to support local businesses but now they are shut some on-line shopping is just how it has to be. Getting the garden furniture out is a real milestone isn’t it? I hope Cliff’s ankle continues to improve and you both enjoy your patio.

    1. Yes, yes. Online shopping is necessary right now. Clif’s ankle is getting better. Thanks for asking. Just not quite up to bringing a table from the cellar to the patio.

      1. We had flowers for the garden delivered through the post for the very first time last week. 🙂 The underwear made me chuckle though. 😉 Have a good weekend. Spring in Norfolk is surely a month or more ahead of you, we’ll spend the day working in the garden. x

  16. The underwear in the mailbox gave me a good double take. For a fleeting moment, I thought it was a hippy game I hadn’t heard about. My sweetheart just got some mail-order undies too, but I’ve always been wary about buying clothes by mail order. The sizes are so unpredictable.

  17. Thanks for giving me a reason to smile. We need this badly with so much negativity in real world. Beautiful photos. Nature knows how to cheer us.

  19. As I’m a Brit and believe we are amongst the most enthusiastic online shoppers in the whole wide world, I’m already an expert. Actually, I’ve been ordering less since the lockdown as the post has become so slow and unreliable. I’m still waiting for my underpants 😉🩲

  20. I wonder, too, how many of these new habits will stick. I think more than we’d expect. People love getting out and mixing things up but we also love convenience. Which will win out?

    1. Yes, yes! I must admit it is nice to have items delivered directly to our doorstep. In a way, at least in Maine, it is kind of a throwback to the old days when many people didn’t have cars, and small markets would make regular deliveries to homes and apartments. Sometimes twice a day.

  21. Thank you for the song. My late sister was a big fan of Natalie Merchant and her music had a role in the memorial service, at my sister’s request.

  23. My first thought about underwear in the mailbox was that it must have been a heck of a night! 🙂

    I don’t mind buying clothes via mail but I’m not keen on footwear, where sizes can vary widely.

  24. Yup, I think I have done more online ordering in the past 6 weeks than I had done in the prior 2 years. No longer so easy to just drive over to the hardware store for a bit of this or that. But as you say, spring still comes. Over the weekend the migrating birds made their first appearances – orioles and grosbeaks. Still waiting for the hummingbirds.

  25. I hate to support the empire of Amazon but we are buying a lot of things online to avoid shopping including, this week, oatmeal of all things! At least for books, we can find an alternate source like Abe Books.

    1. Actually, it’s been a little to chilly to enjoy a glass of something else on the patio. But this is Maine, and we expect chilly weather in the spring.

  27. When I saw the title of the blog I could hear Natalie Merchant’s voice! It made me so happy. I have not kept up with your delightful blog because I am busy participating in distance learning with my 26 kindergarten students! It has kept me very busy with technology difficulties for not only me but also for my student’s parents. Teaching online points out the horrible inequities between the “haves” and the “have nots.” I feel even more passionate and committed to public education. It does have unsolved issues but it is a place where we can equally have access to lessons, materials and information!
    I hope you are able to use your patio soon. ❤

    1. Oh, my gosh! How busy you must be. Thanks for stopping by, and best of luck with your students. Yes, to all you said about public education. Where would many of us be without it? Uneducated and possibly illiterate.

Comments are closed.