Sometimes when you are in the middle of something, you don’t really see it. Reading the scores of posts on blogs, Facebook and elsewhere and seeing the photos other people took and reading the words other people wrote, I get a clearer idea of something quite remarkable that occurred on Sunday, something powerful and affirming.

We are already at work on next  year’s Open Houses – the first in mid-June, the second on or before Labor Day. I’ve invited George Forss to come and take portraits of people (I think he charges $30) and what an opportunity that will be for people, to be photographed by one of the world’s great photographers, a great friend of mine. (Hint. Do not mention aliens.) Maria will have her own ideas about her own work and that of some other artists.

When I think of Sunday, some scenes recur:

– I think of our friend Mary Kellogg, now in her 83rd year, looking so beautiful and reading her wonderful poems, living her life so richly and meaningfully and independently. Mary is an inspiration to everyone she meets, a radiant spirit who lights up every space she is in.

– I think of seeing Jennifer Bowman, a gifted writer I have been following for some years, watching as she emerges and finds her voice, the wonderful feeling of hugging her and of telling her boyfriend Travis right to his face that I had a literary crush on his girl friend. A family therapist, he barely blinked.

– I was privileged to see the moment when Tess Wynn and Celinda Chambers called out one another’s name and hugged, two friends who had met only online, on the Open Group At Bedlam Farm.