I am reading Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. The Annie Dillard book. It is a journey of nature and mind. Written about a creek in Virginia.

The tone, the beauty. It inspires me to write. Annie isn’t a writer. She is a painter. You can feel the wind in her words. They glow with the sunshine. There is so much beauty in every day. But we miss it because we are busy. We don’t stop. We don’t look.

And we wonder why our lives are dry and dull.

I want to write. To paint the scene on the page. If I could only learn how to type.

I am sitting on my bed spread. It is black and white. Flowers of black with a white background. On pillows in the corner. In deep sleep. My Baby Girl rests. Sound asleep. She is also black and white. She looks like a Holstein cow. I guess I don’t know cows. I thought it was a Jersey cow. Until I just checked it on Google.

Where did we get information before Google?

My bed now is a mess. Piles of books. A bag of cheese bread sticks from Wal-Mart. The books are both from the library and some I own. I read far too many books at the same time. Or rather I try to read.

Right now I think maybe I am reading five or six. Cat toys are on my bed from when I cleaned the floor.

The time for rest is nearing. I will join Baby Girl in dream land. Maybe tomorrow I will continue on my novel. But today I needed a break.

Work was good. A new worker asked me today, “you bounce around all over the place?” I replied it was just what I did. “Is that why they hired you for?” “No.”

But I like it. It is always a different day. Yesterday it was deli for most of the day. Today I spent a lot of time in Dairy stocking eggs and milk. We sell gallons and gallons of milk at our store.

Some days I push carts. Some I run the register. Some I feel like I run from one thing to the next all day long. But I still like it.

An older man asked me today to help him get some sugar off the top shelf. I’ll meet you over there I told him. There was another person with a question. Then I did something else and forgot. But then I remembered and when I turned to walk down the main aisle I could see him peaking around the corner. I apologized. But he was friendly about the whole encounter.

I am trying at work to not speak in a negative way about my co-workers. Some of them don’t make it easy. Judged by my own standards they are not performing their job duties. What I have to remember is I am not paid to monitor what they do or how they spend their time. Just focus on what is the task before me and focus on doing it the best I can. Tomorrow is day 5 of 8.

What I have to understand is my standards are mine.