I can't see it, but I can hear it.  It's a tiny blue-gray thing with a tufted head, and even though the temperature is still in the thirties, I've thrown open the window so that I can hear it better.  It seems to be calling around to see if anyone else has arrived yet.  If ever a year needed a spring it's this one.  Now in the distance I've started hearing other types of birds joining the chorus.  Of all the things I miss in winter, including light, birdsong is in the top three.

There is an ocean separating me from where I want to be right now.  Funeral preparations proceed for Jim, who will be laid out in Saint David's Church in Mold, North Wales on Thursday evening in preparation for his Mass on Friday morning at ten, led by the Bishop.  It will be five o'clock here, and I'll be up, saying the rosary with the ring he gave me years ago, and listening to "Jerusalem" through my iPod, rocking and weeping in the ancient tradition of "keening".  Nothing will help the pain.  Still, I know that under the melting snow outside my window there are daffodils, the flower of Wales, which will emerge in a few weeks to remind me of my precious friend, and to connect me to him and remind me that it takes more than death to break the bond of love.

I love community theater.  I watch it, I perform in it, I paint sets, usher, and sweep floors for it.  I have even been known to clean the toilet, in spite of the fact that I'm reluctant to tackle that job at home.  Lately, however, I do find that it is getting on my nerves in one particular area.  There are no roles for women "of a certain age".  Well, that's not strictly true.  There are some, and there is a circle of delightful and talented women whose company I greatly enjoy who all audition for the same parts.  When I walk into the audition hall there are hugs and kisses on cheeks and gabfests as though among long lost friends, and let me make it quite clear that this is all genuine and authentic admiration and affection we're seeing here.  Nevertheless, I have been forced to form the "O.N.C."  That's not the real name.  The middle letter is different, but I didn't want to offend anyone. 

When I see these wonderful, talented, and delightful women, the little voice in my head says, and I paraphrase here, "Oh NUTS!  She's here!"  I'm not proud of it, but there you have it.  When I look at those gifted ladies I do a mental rundown of their past theatrical triumphs and realize that I haven't got the prayer of a snowball in hell to get the part.  Oh, once in a while I get something here or there.  I played Kate Keller in Arthur Miller's "All My Sons" a few years back and it got nice reviews.  And I can sing, which helps narrow the field a little.  In the long run, however, I am playing with the big girls here, and I'm over my head.  These ladies are so dear to me (and not the least bit stuck on themselves, any of them) that I have paid them the compliment of informing them of their membership in the O.N.C., of which, since I thought of it in the first place, I am President.  Let me tell you, I didn't have to explain the concept.  They all got it right away.

This rainy Sunday afternoon I have just returned from a performance of "The Savannah Disputation" which starred not one, but TWO members of the O.N.C.  I had auditioned for the part of the "sweeter" sister (although I would have preferred to be the witch, but Sharon nailed that role) and got as far as the callbacks, but I lost out to Karen, who did an amazing job and really deserved the role and put a spin on it which would never have occurred to me.  In a situation like that you don't so much watch the play as dissect it.  I was so hoping to find a major flaw.  No such luck.  It was fabulous.

So, once again, my ego in tatters, but my heart full of admiration, I take off my hat to the ladies of the O.N.C.  We are an amazing group.  And I made Karen Vice President.  Good thing we don't actually have elections.  I might be out of a job there, too!

Did you miss me yesterday?  I missed you!  And why?  Because someone somewhere cut a fiber optic cable and there was no internet from 9 o'clock yesterday morning until sometime in the wee hours of this morning.  You know the kind of panic THAT sort of thing engenders.  When did I become such a cyborg that I cannot take a deep breath without checking Facebook, or comments to this blog, or the weather once an hour?  At what point did my cell phone become the equivalent of a pacemaker, so that I have anxiety attacks when I realize I've left the house without it?  This is just silly.

As I lay awake this morning I pondered these and other weighty issues.  How many years have these electronic invaders been running my life?  What did we all do in the days when we relied on the telephone and GASP! the hand-written note to communicate?  Remember when it took effort to keep in touch, so we only kept in touch with the people we actually cared two hoots about?  If I remembered your birthday it was because I wrote it on my calendar in ink, and at the end of the year I transferred it onto my new calendar because you were a person who mattered in my life, not because a pink wrapped box popped up in the top right screen to tell me today was your big day.  Well, here's a bulletin:  I still write it in ink on my calendar, because you do, indeed, matter.  Oh, I send out a "HBTY" to acquaintances, but the friends who go back (and I am grateful that there are so many of you) know who you are.  I don't need a reminder.

My sons were worried about "missing their high school friends" when they went off to college.  Hah!  They play video games with one another across the country.  They chat face-to-face on a regular basis, and get constant updates on every trivial event.  And it requires zero strain on their part.  I think they're missing out on something.  The effort is part of the gift of friendship.

Don't get me wrong.  I love being able to catch up with so many more people than I used to, and I can't tell you how much I miss my almost daily e-mails from my Dear Friend Flanagan.  But at some level of my soul I was calmer yesterday.  I worked on the extremely imperfect scarf I'm knitting for Son Number One in his school colors.  I played the piano.  I read.  It was a mini-vacation.  Perhaps it's one I should take voluntarily more often.

One of the paybacks for the pain of childbirth, years of cramps, and mood swings is the ineffable joy that only women (well...and a few cross-dressers) experience at the end of the day when slipping out of pantyhose.  It is a bliss that dwarfs the best chocolate in the world.  This is probably one of the real reasons that people bemoan the end of summer.  The sandals go on in May and come off with a crowbar around the time chilblains are forming on the toes.  So when I needed to get "dressed like a grownup" for a job interview I had to try to remember what I had actually done with said instruments of torture at the beginning of spring.  Not one clue.  I put on the suit, the tasteful earrings with matching necklace, the heels, but my legs were bare.  And then it dawned on me.  I had read an article that the Duchess of Cambridge ("Kate" to her friends), had "revived" the trend to wear hose.  I was a little surprised since I was never aware they had gone out of style.  Just my rotten luck that I had missed the fad I'd been waiting for since I was thirteen.  And now it was over.  Or was it? 

I seemed to remember that there was a discussion about how "old fashioned" it was to wear hose and how surprising it was that the Duchess was going that route.  OK.  If it's old fashioned, maybe I could get away with being "with it" by being "without it" and not bothering.  I felt absolutely racy, but I was running short of time, so off I went.  All the way to the interview I held the debate in my head.  "Should I? What does this say about me? Does it say I'm on top of the trends or down on my luck and can't afford L'eggs? (Do they still make L'eggs?)"  This was a burning issue.  With ten minutes to spare I stopped at the grocery store and picked up a pair of Sheer Energy in nude (if you wear them, they HAVE to match your skin tone) and stuck them in my purse.  I asked the opinion of the cashier and her bag boy.  "Do people wear pantyhose anymore?"  Heads shook from side to side.  "Can I get away with this?"  "Well, what are you wearing?  Is that the outfit?  C'mere!"  I got the once over and was gratified to receive two thumbs up.

I made it to the interview in plenty of time.  I don't know if the panel noticed that I wasn't wearing hose.  They were busy watching me scramble when my telephone screamed a message from my purse that the nursing home was calling me for the second time in two years.  I tried to ignore it, but they insisted that I take it. Things went rather well, other than that, or at least I think so.  The whole day was quite an education. And by the way, have you tried to buy a slip lately?