I went out to write last night; brought along a Moroccan carrot salad and a prompt involving coins and Peterson's Field Guide to the Birds. There were eight of us there, everyone excited to visit and to write, everyone producing intense first drafts. I came home all of a buzz, and T, who had just gotten home from developing film at the photo co-op and was heating up leftover chicken, asked about the prompts and the drafts--so I read him my blurts and showed him the prompts and he was intrigued by the oddness and pleasure of capturing one's first clumsy reaction to an unexpected catalyst. So that was enjoyable, as I don't routinely share poems with him. We're not the same sort of artist, and we don't collaborate much, but sometimes we do talk about making. These late evenings, when we go out separately and then meet again afterward, are remarkably pleasant. I think we both like to know that the other is doing something, making something, and in the small stretch before bedtime we ask questions, enjoy listening. It's a good moment in a long day.

Today I'll finish up the editing project, do a pile of laundry, figure out what to cook for dinner, and then midafternoon I'll drive to band practice. The new fat editing project is due to arrive this afternoon; P comes in from NYC on Sunday, and then Monday we'll be on the road; work, work, work, and then I'm supposedly teaching an essay class next weekend, if it fills. My temporarily slow-paced life will return to frenzy. Ah, the freelance lifestyle.

But I wrote a big poem. I conceived a new writing project. I started playing the violin again. I read a mountain of books. I thought I was wasting time, but it turns out that I wasn't.