Hello, Everyone!
If you are like me, you are enjoying the 2nd day of a 3-day weekend. I love these 3-day weekends. It’s a chance to catch up on what I can’t complete during a regular weekend. I try to clean and weed in the garden, then I sit in front of my laptop and write. If I can complete 2,500 words on a Saturday and a Sunday each, I feel as if I’ve accomplished something.
This weekend was a little different. I hadn’t had a chance to plant my flower garden yet, which was a good thing because of the cold temperatures and snow we received, so we joined the crowds at the nursery and packed my husband’s jeep with petunias and cone flowers and snap dragons and then spent Saturday planting as much as we could. I like planting these flowers because the rabbits don’t eat these. I used to plant impatiens and coleus, but then the rabbits discovered them and devoured them. That made me so sad because the impatiens and coleus are so colorful and give me something beautiful to look at while I sit in the family room and write.
All that planting should have made me exhausted, but I hate going to bed early on the weekend. It’s the one time I can stay up late and not worry about getting up early the next morning. I take advantage of that. Since, I’m past the age of staying out late with friends and partying, I usually sit in the family room with my laptop and scroll through YouTube looking for old movies to watch. And I’m talking really old – like silent movies. I had found some Jackie Coogan clips. He was a child star during the silent film era. He made a film with Charlie Chaplin, a silent film star, called The Kid. And he was a cute little kid. He was born in 1917 and the film was made in 1921, so he was only 3 or 4 years old when the film was made. The movie is touching with Jackie Coogan playing a child abandoned by his mother. He ends up with Charlie Chaplin as his guardian living a life of petty crime. Eventually, Jackie Coogan is reunited with his mother and all live happily ever after. If any of you remember The Addams Family television show, you’ll remember Jackie Coogan as Uncle Fester.
Another person I like to watch is Vivien Leigh. She starred as Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind. She had an interesting life. She married young and had a child then decided to pursue acting so she left her husband and child and went to Hollywood. There she met Lawrence Olivier with whom she lived for a number of years. They eventually married though the marriage was rocky. At one point she was committed to a mental institution. The day she was released the reporters greeted her and photographed her. She looked tired and haggard, not the beautiful belle who flounced around the plantation in white petticoats, but she was gracious, smiling for the cameras. Maybe that was what was expected in those days. I had watched the auditions for Gone with the Wind and it’s obvious why Vivien Leigh won the part. She was petite and feisty and lit up the screen. Other well-known stars of the era auditioned and you can see these tapes on YouTube, but I believe Vivien Leigh was the right choice.
When I start nodding off, I find my way to the bedroom, but there’s no sleeping in the following morning. If I sleep too much during the weekend, then I’m up late during the week and falling asleep at work is unacceptable.
I hope you enjoyed some time off, and maybe caught up on planting or other chores during the weekend. Better yet, if you were able to make it the perfect weekend by planning a trip and getting away from that to-do list, my hat is off to you. That to me is the perfect 3-day weekend. Have a wonderful week!
Love,
Laura
