2006-11-20 - 7:58 a.m.

..sun is out!!..

Yesterday we had a surprising break in the weather that has lasted into this morning. I am looking out at a sunrise into a blue sky! It's o-so lovely. The break came yesterday afternoon, and so K and I had lunch on the back porch, basking in warm sunlight.

We spent yesterday afternoon doing some cleaning and re-arranging. Up to this point we have not really used our solarium, and I have spent all of my hours working at the kitchen table. This has meant that our kitchen table is constantly covered with my crap (i.e., work), which is a bit irritating when you wish to have a meal.

This weekend we shortened the legs of K's beautiful chess table so that it is teranika-height, and I have relocated to the solarium. Now I work on a magnificently inlaid wooden chess table. (covered with glass so that I don't destroy it with crumbs and coffee rings). It's a few degrees colder out here, but nevertheless I have some lovely views when the sunrise is visible :-).

I got a wonderful, wonderful email from the high school student I was mentoring. I've included it here:

I've told countless people how lucky I felt to have such an amazing mentor..From the beginning I was never made to feel like a lowly high school student that wasn't expected to know anything or like I was expected to know more than I possibly could. Even when it came time to write the paper and at times I did begin to feel like a lowly high school student that didn't know what she was doing, entirely of my own accord, you got me through it. Not only that, but you spent an entire Saturday online with me when I'm sure there were many, many things you'd rather have been doing. Other students had mentors that moved out of the country, but I don't think it's possible that any of them still devoted as much time to their students as you did.

I wish I could buy you a pony or something to show you how grateful I am. I don't know why a pony, or what exactly you would do with a pony, but its a gesture of the magnitude that I am looking for--or really, it's just evidence that I really do not know how to express my gratitude in words. Just know that if I had that kind of power, there would probably be something really cool named after you somewhere.

How is that to make you feel like you've done something worthwhile? **sniff** I feel ten feet tall and I have a big grin on my face. Sunshine indeed.