We don't make much of a fuss about Mother's Day in this household. Still, I had a nice one. I talked to my own mother and to both of my sons. I mentioned to Tom that I was worried about the tomato and pepper seedlings scheduled to arrive next weekend (weather too cold, seedlings too delicate), and he immediately made me a cold frame out of scrap lumber and plastic sheeting. And then, in the afternoon, he and Paul went canoeing on the Presumpscot River and I was alone in the house for five hours . . . a pandemic luxury.

So I washed floors and copied out Rilke and read Undset and took a small nap, started a fire in the stove, cut fresh flowers for the vases, drank tea . . . I could have done any of this with people in the house, but the spacious quiet was like salt.

And now, on the whatever-Monday of the whatever-month of the new world order, Tom is getting ready for work, the cat is prowling through the garden, the boy is sleeping, and I am wondering if I dare risk hanging out laundry with thunderstorms in the forecast. Yesterday my brand-new splurge arrived--a 2-quart ice-cream maker--the first fun thing I've bought for months, and a good way to use the peculiar fruit available from the warehouse. Tom loves sorbet, and what else can I do with 10 kiwis? This afternoon I will christen the machine with a batch of chocolate-chip ice cream. Kiwi sorbet will be next.

In the meantime, editing editing editing. Later Teresa and I will have a Rilke phone call. This evening my poetry group is meeting. The boys are tasked with ordering pizza for dinner.

Doesn't our life sound normal?

Or maybe it doesn't sound normal at all.

Or maybe I'm avoiding the definition of normal.

Or maybe there's no such thing.