A couple of days ago, Raina spent the night with some folksinger friends in Western Mass who are friends from way back with Dar Williams. They presented Raina with a picture of Dar wearing a “Raina Rose Loves Me” button. A very cool thing for those of us who adore Dar.

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I feel like my days are passing at speeds faster than allowed on Montana highways in the mid-1990’s (somehow I don’t think that the words “reasonable and prudent” constitute an effective speed limit). I spent most of Thursday and Friday laying low and trying to accomplish some things, but the pace at which I do things never seems to keep up with the rate at which items add themselves to my to-do list.

I am hurtling towards the end of the semester. I am in a bit of shock that in a few weeks I will have completed more than half of this Masters degree and that by December I will be done with school entirely. I am completely uncertain about what happens when I am done, although I have hopes that I will magically turn some of my creative endeavors into activities that pay me enough to keep my roof firmly in place over my head. Right now I’m just trying to keep my focus long enough to finish the semester and get myself to the summer term, when I will only have one class to keep track of.

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Raina and I had brunch today with some of the Philly family in our cousin Angie’s apartment (she lives downstairs from me). The food was delicious but the main attraction was Derek, who is rapidly approaching his 3-month birthday. He is a peaceful baby who is happy being held by any person in the room. Raina and I both spend some time holding him, feeling waves of baby-lust as he slept in our arms (confessed to each other in low voices as headed back upstairs).

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Over the last four years I have eaten countless meals with my friend Cindy. Tonight marked the last time I’ll have an opportunity to eat dinner with her on a Sunday night in her backyard. She announced Tuesday that she is moving to Pittsburgh (her hometown) to go back to school and she is leaving in less than a month. It didn’t come as a suprise to me that Cindy is leaving Philadelphia, she’s been gearing up for it for some time, but now that the departure is real and rapidly approaching, I am still feeling the loss like a pang. I have a hard time conceiving of a summer’s worth of warm evenings and not being able to call her unexpectedly to meet up for a drink or ice cream.