I wake slowly into this Sunday morning and lay still, thinking of earlier years on April the second.
This is the day my former in-laws married nearly a century ago. I think of all the ways their union interfaced with my life when I met and married their son four decades ago.
The sweet cat snuggled at my hip shifts position and I’m reminded that this is the day I have designated as his birthday, when, in 2009, I discovered him abandoned in my backyard, his eyes not yet open.
I think of my son, Keith, who left this world on this day in 1973. Time has softened that loss over the decades and it pleases me that I can smile today and see his happy, impish face on a summer afternoon beneath sunshine in the park. I fill with deep gratitude for the time we shared together.
I think of yesterday, outside with my camera, delighting in the beauty of the multitude of bright purple violets sprinkled all over these acres. One flower alone possesses such beauty that it is all I need for deep thankfulness to wash through my limbs, yet I’ve been given a multitude.
I rise, filled with some of the rich history of this day. The cat nuzzles me lovingly as I put food in his dish and the dog rises from the couch, stretches, and yawns with a little squeak. I wish these sweet souls a good morning and click on the dog’s leash. We slide the door open and step out into a bright sunny day, where a singular bird fills my psyche with her rich beautiful song as does the magenta glow of the red bud tree unfolding into a new season yet again. I greet this morning filled with the rich history of other days from my April the second book, and wonder what this April the second will bring. My heart is open.
About Mary Jo Doig
Mary Jo Doig was the first in her family to attend college and graduated from the State University at Oneonta in New York’s Catskill Mountains with a degree in Secondary English Education/Educational Psychology. There she fell in love with rural life, remained, and eventually transitioned from city girl to country woman when she married a dairy farmer and raised their three children on their small family farm.
A life-long lover of reading and writing, Mary Jo has for nearly twenty years been a member of the Story Circle Network. There she has been an editor, a women’s writing circle facilitator, a book reviewer, and life-writing enthusiast, working extensively with women writing their life-stories while writing her own memoir. Presently, she is a three-time Program Chair for SCNs national Stories from the Heart conference and a board member. She also facilitates Older Women’s Legacy workshops and a women’s life-writing circle in her area communities. Her stories have appeared in Kitchen Table Stories anthology, Story Circle Annual Anthologies, and most recently her story “I Can’t Breathe” was published in the Anthology, Inside and Out: Women’s Truths, Women’s Stories. Her work also appears in varied blogs and periodicals, on her blog Musings from a Patchwork Quilt Life (https://maryjod.wordpress.com), Facebook, and Twitter.
Her son and two daughters grown, Mary Jo presently treasures her country life in Virginia’s Central Shenandoah Valley. She loves cooking (and eating!) healthy food, reading, writing, quilting, hiking, and spending quality time with her rescue cats, Button and Xena, and beagle, Addie, who each dream of being only children.
Her first book, Patchwork: A Memoir of Love and Loss, will be published in October, 2018 by She Writes Press.
Musings From a Patchwork Quilt Life 
Simply lovely, Mary Jo. Wishing you a magical day filled with new wonders, my friend.
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Many thanks, Linda. I’ll record this day in my book of April the seconds…. And I wish you the same kind of day.
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A very touching tapestry … intriguing alignment of diverse events tied by a date. Beautiful like your violets, even with the sadness. And thank you for a bit of vicarious sunshine – Austin is under a swirling wind&rain storm this April 2.
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Thank you for your lovely tapestry analogy, Jazz. May today’s water nurture your land just enough and the wind, as the Irish saying goes, be gentle at your back.
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This is beautiful, Mary Jo. And it breaks my heart a little, as beauty is wont to do. Thank you.
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Thank you for your lovely words, Gretchen.
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