Thoughts swirling through my head today on only a few hours of sleep. Once again I woke up around 4:00 this morning. Why does this keep happening? We must get a new mattress and an actual bed.

As I drifted in and out of sleep I kept dreaming about [title of show]. Still thinking about the first preview the other night. I can’t get these lyrics out of my head today:

I’d rather be
Nine people’s favorite thing
Than a hundred people’s ninth favorite thing

I’m still thinking about our holiday weekend. It was really nice — we did at least one fun thing on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, which had not been the norm for us lately.

On Thursday night I opened up my cardboard box of memorabilia. I’d taped it up when we moved last fall and hadn’t opened it since. I wanted to dig through my old journals, but I wound up spending the evening looking through a few hundred photographs that have been sitting in various drugstore envelopes for years. Then I pored over words I’d written almost exactly 10 years ago.

On Friday afternoon we saw WALL-E. I loved it. Can’t recommend it highly enough. One of the most poetic and beautiful animated films I’ve ever seen. I want my own WALL-E to keep as a pet. I also realized that the shape of his head is similar to E.T.’s. I wonder if that was intentional.

After the movie, we went to a Fourth of July party at our friends’ place and watched the fireworks from their roof. It was raining, and the rain weighed down the smoke over the East River and kept it from dissipating, so most of the fireworks were obscured. That was kind of disappointing.

Saturday night was [title of show], and yesterday afternoon we went to my parents’ house for a little family hangout. My dad grilled up burgers, chicken skewers, and steak, and we ate outside. My parents have done lots of gardening this summer and there were flowers everywhere, as well as a few bird feeders that attracted lots of birds (and some squirrels and, I think, a couple of rats). My parents’ backyard is surrounded by tall trees, which were fully green in mid-summer bloom. It was such a nice respite from the city. I think human beings need to commune with nature — it touches something inherent in us. It grounds us and reminds us where we came from. It slows us down, re-synchronizes us with the clock of the world. Trees, plants and animals are so much realer and truer than concrete and plaster and pixels and plastic.

Alas, all weekends come to an end. But I don’t want to waste this summer like I usually do. Matt and I should try to get away somewhere, even if just for a couple of days. I want to slow down and appreciate summer for once.