Saturday in Greencastle

Yesterday I had no outing to look at any covered bridges or to explore the charms of Bloomington. Instead, I reveled in the charms of my own Greencastle.

First upon waking I called my sister. Our Saturday morning phone calls are a sisterly tradition of many decades, but now we have the fun of being in the same time zone for the first time in almost twenty years.

Then: off to the farmers' market to buy apple squares at my favorite farmers' stand, after an initial panic from finding that it had shifted its location in the square. Many other DePauw faculty were there, pushing strollers and filling totebags with freshly harvested local produce. I also took the occasion to go on a shopping spree at the Goodwill store, where I bought three skirts that I adore and six tops, for a total expenditure of $28. One of the skirts I love more than anything else in my entire wardrobe.

Colleague Jen and her adorable two-and-a-half-year-old daughter Clara stopped by for a visit, and I had the fun of sitting on my little front porch with Clara and rabbit puppet Ruby, chatting about various vehicles that passed by: truck, motorcycle. After they departed, it was time to meet up with a student who is interested in writing children's books for lunch at the Blue Door Cafe. Everything in Greencastle is so compactly organized that we finished up our meeting in the children's room of the public library, a block away, to look at books that might be a model for the kind of project she is interested in pursuing.

In the afternoon I stopped in briefly at Putnam County Airport Appreciation Day, to see little planes and helicopters of all kinds taking off and landing. But then I returned home for my own Jane Austen Appreciation Day and spent the afternoon rereading Emma in preparation for the meeting of the Janeites book club on Tuesday evening.

The day ended with dinner at the home of two friends, a five-minute walk from my house. We talked for hours. And then I walked home and climbed into bed and finished the last chapters of Emma.

So this is the report of my Greencastle Appreciation Day.