The violets are passing their peak; next week they'll be gone. The lady slippers are budding along the side of the trail in the leaves under the trees. I go to the woods early before it's hot. I'm looking forward to an uninterrupted writing day. 

In the early afternoon I retreat to the art barn, a building next to our house that's quiet and secluded. I open my essay hoping to find ways to "solve it." I have been reading an article by Annie Dillard, "Write Till You Drop," in which she writes:

I have come into the studio with the intention of being hopeful, thoughtful, focused, and to re-craft it word by word, paragraph by paragraph, starting back at the beginning. So, I dig in. I re-write, proceeding, methodically. And then I get a text. My daughter wonders if I want to walk with her and the dogs. No thank you, I say, and she goes. I keep working, and by the third paragraph or fourth paragraph, I suddenly have a breakthrough - in the sense that I see an element of the structure I have not seen before. Dillard captures this feeling, calls it- "grace."

Then I get another text, this time with a picture. She has reached the lady slippers and found one, not just with an unopened blossom, she has found one blooming - the first. Do you want to  come see them she asks?

Yes, now I do. 

All photos and text copyright Kelly DuMar 2018 unless otherwise attributed