All afternoon, I work on my back deck. Hummingbirds dart at the hanging nasturtiums, rain sprinkling down around the porch roof. In the late afternoon, I swop jeans for shorts, tie on my shoes, and head out for a run. I run for maybe a mile, no more, then walk in circles, my hands on my hips. The mid-August world is a crazy abundance, hydrangeas and Queen Anne’s Lace reveling in their showiness.

I had thought I would never run again, that kind of energy and strength irremediably sapped by disease and treatment. Yet, this afternoon, I determine, Well, what you do know… Ahead lies a long evening of a Selectboard meeting in a particularly Vermont-vein: the nuts-and-bolts of the town’s daily business of salt and sheriff contracts, what to do about wastewater, and the passion projects of conserving land and eliminating streetlights. A microcosm of the country in a former schoolroom where everyone is on a first-name basis. Like it or not.

Long past nightfall, I’m home again, lying on the couch and reading Louise Erdrich, cats between my knees, the windows open and the crickets sizzling. Above, photo of myself with beloved daughters. After chemo, my hair returned in ringlets, the straight hair of my childhood replaced by exuberant happiness.

“Green Apples” by Ruth Stone

In August we carried the old horsehair mattress
To the back porch
And slept with our children in a row.
The wind came up the mountain into the orchard
Telling me something:
Saying something urgent.
I was happy.
The green apples fell on the sloping roof
And rattled down.
The wind was shaking me all night long;
Shaking me in my sleep
Like a definition of love,
Saying, this is the moment,
Here, now.