And B is for bicycle wreck, which is how last week started. The skin on my legs is variegated in the most gorgeous technicolor hues right now, and there’ve been surprise areas of new mottling every day. Funny I didn’t feel all those pop-up bruises from the first instant I hit the pavement. I won’t bore you with the details, but suffice it to say, I made a couple of rookie mistakes and went down hard. (And I am definitely not a bike-riding rookie.) Won’t happen again, I hope, at least not like that.

But I did not go down as hard as a little fella The Chef and I witnessed take a spill yesterday on our long afternoon bike ride (because one must always climb back into the proverbial saddle after all). He was maybe ten and full of joie de vivre, about a half-block out in front of us on a long cul-de-sac. At the precise instant I was about to holler to my riding companion, don’t you just wish you still had that kind of energy, the boy face planted spectacularly into the street. We rushed to his side, where he was already tear-streaked and spitting out blood. Show me your teeth, I beseeched. They’re fine, he insisted but then second-guessed himself and panicked, are they? gape-grinning to reveal them. No damage, thankfully, save a split lower lip and skinned palms.

And a bruised ego, which was the worst of my injuries too. I feel ya, kiddo.

He was impressively self-consoling, and after inspecting his person for a moment and brushing himself off, quipped, I’m okay. We walked him back to his house where an older sibling said thanks and took things from there.

Yesterday was an otherwise exquisite one in coastal North Carolina, which is what got us outside after obligatory morning errands and a failed attempt to hang out downtown (crowds too big, no parking anywhere). We wrapped up in the late afternoon with Scoutie out on the deck at one and the same barbecue place where we had supper the day we were married. Thence to the precise spot down on the Cape Fear River where we said our vows. It is not our anniversary until next weekend, but felt celebratory enough anyway.

Paper, goes the tradition, is what to get your spouse on a first wedding anniversary. Traditions can be so silly, can’t they. Anyway, next Sunday marks eleven years together as a couple, and anyway-anyway, it’s the second marriage for both of us.

We agreed to buy each other some toilet paper and paper towels on our weekend grocery run next Saturday. Paper, check.

I leave you with more of yesterday’s beauty on the Cape Fear.