Obsessing

I have a new take on the saying “A watched kettle never boils.” It’s “a watched grass seed never sprouts.” That assuredly does not apply to weed seeds. After a night and morning of gentle rain, my front side yard is a promising oasis of green. All of it weed sprouts. So, I hope that obsessing about the grass seed from a distance will have the same effect as not watching it up close and personal. Because those little grass seeds had better start putting some effort into it or they’re going to be totally crowded out by the weed sprouts and that would not be a good thing. Therefore, I am going to go run errands, stop at the library, and try to stop secretly hoping that when I get back a miracle will have happened.

Update: 2:26 PM- The errands didn’t take long. I didn’t even bother to look at the grass seed when I came home. I’m now the delighted borrower of: A Canticle for Leibowitz (Walter M. Miller, Jr.), The Orchid Thief (Susan Orlean), and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life (Barbara Kingsolver). I hardly know which one to rip into first.

I confused the heck out of the library lady today. I’d just changed my email address and she wondered if the mailing address on file is the same. It isn’t. So I changed that with her and then she told me I had to go get a library card from the Amesbury library instead of the one I have, since I’ve moved. But I haven’t moved, I said. I just changed my post office box address. I still live in this town. Yeah but...the computer doesn’t understand these finer details. All it sees is Amesbury. Well, I don’t know what to say. I still live in this town and I would have no trouble proving it, which grants me automatic library borrowing privileges. Well, she wondered, can we use your local address instead? Not if you ever intend to mail me anything and expect me to get it. The post office will return it. Confounded computer systems. Surely, I am not the only borrower in this town with a private post box address in another town. Surely. We finally decided to leave my in-town address in the system with a notation that all mail should be held at the library and notification of anything should be accomplished through email or the telephone. I will pick up in person. My goodness, let’s hear it for computer systems streamlining messy life details.