May 15th

Morning opens bright with sun... some light research on the active-volcanic Tongan island of Tofua... tossing biscuits in the oven... 1960s salsa playlist...

Yali walks up to me wearing a Golden Grahams cereal box on his head... “Mom... I need a box of venomous snakes”...

Early afternoon between Puck rolling his eyes over polynomials... perusing his “new” Jag manual...

...Yali is acting the tortured artist pairing film clips with music... “IF PEOPLE WOULD STOP BEING SO LOUD!!!!” he roars from behind his tablet...

…and Patience is picking mulberries from the ladder under a baked sky... the dog eats the ones on the ground below her... so overloaded with juice they fell early...

Patience then returns indoors to prepare boxed pumpkin bread...

...before she and Yali put their heads together to play a new game of their own invention outdoors called “Survival”... which they say will require the eight-man tent...

That evening while Puck is at work...

...Oxbear and Yali hot glue soft bumblebee yellow flannel to Yali's latest costume armor...

...Patience and I back at the studio...

Drive home under fantastic cloudscapes... wind kicking dust into building storm cloud... caramel on white... silky glass ripples building above...

Puck walks home from work... stands in the yard behind the honeysuckle hedge to watch the sky for awhile... now mounds of glowing tropical sherbet...