Silhouettes and Sweaters

A young girl sits in her customary resting place, in front of the spatting fire, and contemplates the the splendid day that she's had. The slight glow of the flames accentuate the silhouette of her hair (pulled into a side bun just below and slightly behind her right ear, with its loose ends hanging out after the happenings of the evening) and bring to life the rich hues of her heathered sweater.

First her mother had made scrumptious, heart-shaped pancakes that, topped with butter and a little bit of brown sugar, had been devoured quite happily by none other than the girl herself. Then there was the opening of made-with-care Valentine's cards from mother and sisters. Each one was given with much love and a sweet note from the sender (and there was even chocolate, the girl rather suspects her mother guilty of this splendid act). After this there was the customary devotional with the mother and youngest sister (and, of course, the youngest sibling who has yet to be known by the world) it included the reading of a hard-backed blue Bible, the instruction for living the life of a woman after God's own heart from a book written by Elizabeth George, followed by a novel about a scholarly young lady who finds herself in the midst of an adventure in what seems to be a place of faeries and mystical beings. Next came the doing of the girl's school, which sometime just before noon was interrupted by the pleasant surprise of flowers sent by one of her most loved heroes, her father, with a note who's end read "Love, daddy". She placed them atop the hope-chest that he'd built especially for her some time ago (a lovely thing made of pine and stained a deep "cherry red" that looks something like mahogany and then with a polish over the top that makes it shine like the treasure-box it is). This was followed by more school, and then a break for lunch, and then more school again until sometime after the fourth afternoon hour, which ushered in a time of preparation where the girl readied herself for a nice dinner with her mother and sisters at local restaurant with spicy foods and peanut sauces and plenty of rice. It really was a lovely time, full of happy talk and the ponderings of whether military men or scholars can best withstand intolerably spicy foods. They returned home eventually of course, and then the girl had to finish up the bit of school that she had left to do (by this point her hair had already begun to fight its way out of its confining pins) which she did as quickly as she could manage so that she would be able to eat a brownie while listening to a dramatized retelling of St. Valentine's heroic tale with the family of her's that was home at the time. And then it was all over... and here she sit's in her customary place in front of the fire, contemplating the the day with the glowing embers accentuating her silhouette and the colour of her cozy sweater while she writes about her day and the fire that does all this accentuating and highlighting of silhouettes and sweaters.