Not lol. Loll.

I don't lol. I don't mean laugh out loud - if you know me, you know I do that raucously. I mean I don't write "lol" to signify I am laughing out loud. I am nearly 57 and it isn't becoming. I would have cringed had my mother said "far out" as an exclamation in my youth, and no doubt Love Child would cringe at my writing "lol" in social media or anywhere else. (I do write WTF in text messages, but he doesn't usually read my texts, so he is spared embarrassment.)

In any case, I do not lol, but I do loll, as in around. As in lollygag. Summer increases my need to loll, particularly in the sun, and Vermont has only intensified the need this summer, because the air smells so darn good, like green, like cool water. 

Right now, I'm staying in a lovely house with a screened porch, complete with a sun-loving kitten who shows absolutely no guilt about lollygagging. He works hard and fast in the morning, knocking things off the shelves, chewing on my computer, spinning a pen across the floor, licking my breakfast, then curls up in the sun by me and yawns. He is an excellent teacher; now I work hard and fast in the mornings, too, and when the sun starts leaning in through the screens, I curl up and yawn. 

Chemo has given me a very particular justification for lolling. When I feel horrid, I need to focus on something to both remember and look forward to, and on the scale of great things to remember and look forward to, lolling in the sun in Vermont ranks in the nosebleed level of the range, way up there. I'm grateful for my teacher.