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Category: time

Double Digits

Double Digits

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January takes its time. It does not rush. It dawdles. It sashays down the runway of months with all the model moves. The turn, the pivot, the pout, the graceful sweep. 

I don’t want to be rude, but get moving, Jan. We know your power — your winds, rain, snow and cold. We know what you can do. We know you have the days to do it in, too: a full complement of 31.At least we’re in the double digits now.

In my house the Christmas tree has come down, the decorations are boxed and shelved, the living room corner is dark and boring. 

Spring has been known to peek around the edges of February, but there’s one long month in its way. A month that feels like it should already be over. I’m talking about you, Jan.

Two Minutes

Two Minutes

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The tea has two more minutes to steep. I have things to do. Can I write a two-minute post? Yes, I can, though it will not be one of the best ones I’ve ever written. It may not even be mediocre. But it will be completed.

This is not the way I typically commune with the page, but I’m deadline-driven enough that when necessary I can put on some speed.

There’s only one thing about a two-minute post — or at least this two-minute post. It’s only about writing a two-minute post. Nothing else.

Darkness to Light

Darkness to Light

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At 6:45 there is barely any light in the sky. Holiday displays mark the boundaries of street and yard. Our beacon, as they’re intended to be. As for other illumination, it’s still scarce. How easy it is this time of year to think that darkness is winning.

I look out my office window, can barely make out each tree trunk. But the longer I stare, the more individual limbs and branches begin to show themselves, a filigree of darkness against the lightening clouds. The sky is a blotter sopping up the light. Darkness still reigns on ground level; nothing distinct down there yet. No trampoline, garden bench or witch hazel tree. All of that is out of sight, a void. Instead, my eyes are drawn toward the sky, and toward a faint blush of pink gathering around the tree line.

My window faces south, so the big show is out of sight, to my left. I walk into the other room, peer out the window. Dawn barely underway. A smudge of red on the horizon. But walking back in here just 15 minutes later, what a change. Now I see the covered garden bench, the limbs of the witch hazel tree, the white husks of the shells bordering its garden, the azalea and its entourage. The border of leaves and grass.

By 7:12 it is unqualifiedly morning. What a difference 28 minutes can make.

Time and Memories

Time and Memories

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I’m reminded this morning that it’s been 60 years to the day since President Kennedy was shot. The act that defined our country for many years, until the other tragedies came along. 

Now there are young adults who were born after 9/11, who have no direct or televised experience of the smoldering ruins or the silent skies. 

Time marches on; memories do not. They stay locked in place — in amber, perhaps, or something far less valuable. They define us, as a generation and as a people. 

How do we honor them and move on? Only by understanding them, I guess, by realizing the many ways they hold us in their thrall. 

Palimpsest

Palimpsest

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Rain dislodges leaves and sends them dripping and dropping into the backyard, which is already covered with them. Nothing like the old days, when we would wade through them ankle deep, but still a presence, a reminder of the season. 

When I look at the leaves from my upstairs window, I see a palimpsest, a manuscript that tells two stories, the lines on top and the faint scratches beneath: a new story and an older one. I see the yard as it is now, but I also see the yard of yore, little girls jumping into piles of brown and gold. 

Those little girls are grown. Now their children come to jump in the leaves, to bounce on the trampoline, to run and dance and play. But when I look at the yard I don’t just see the newest little people, I see the ones that are no more, the young women who are once again the children I knew them to be.

Stan’s Side

Stan’s Side

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For the last few days I’ve been getting to know an old friend, Standard — Stan for short.

I haven’t seen him since March, but here he is again, and up to his usual tricks: early mornings, early evenings, a sense that darkness is winning. In a way, it’s not his fault. He arrives on the scene just as the light is fading, and departs when it’s coming into its own. He’s left holding the bag.

Some people want to banish him forever. Others think we should get rid of his flashy cousin. Until we do one or the other, Stan will be the sober fellow who says “you really should go home now, it’s getting dark” or “early to bed and early to rise.” 

If you happen to catch him in the morning, though … it’s a different story. Trust me, I know.  

(Two sunrise photos in a row? Stan made me do it.)

Endless Summer

Endless Summer

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There was a freeze warning last night, and the furnace is humming as I type these words. Time to remember warmer weather. 

I’m thinking of a beach: salt air, gentle surf, an inquisitive egret strolling through the waves, eyeing the bait bucket as he passes a fisherman on the shore.

I’m remembering the way my body feels in the sun, loose and warm and grateful to be alive.

I’m reliving walks under palm trees, fronds clicking in the breeze and the air heavy and full.

As the season turns, the mind can mutiny, can claim for itself an endless summer. 

Backward Glance

Backward Glance

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I know people who extol the beauties of fall — the color, the crispness, the end of humidity — but I’m not one of them. To me there’s always a backward glance at this time of year.

I don’t mind the heat, I relish cicada song, and I love the long days that summer brings.

So on the last day of this summer, I’m reveling in the sun that’s trying to peak through the ever-thickening cloud cover, and I’m savoring the adventures — from Seattle to Scotland and all the places in between.

Night and Day

Night and Day

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Last night, after the kiddos were rounded up and their weary parents pulled away from the house, heading home, I noted the miracle that’s so easy to ignore this time of year, the great gift of evening daylight. 

Family activities postponed my morning walk, but there was still (barely) enough light to take a late stroll. It had been awhile since I took this walk on the downwind side of the day, and I couldn’t help but notice how different it was. 

Yellow lamplight glowed through windows. Late birds rustled in the trees. Sprinklers made that tst, tst, tst sound. I was the only walker on the road. Houses and lawns that look ordinary at 8:30 a.m. look positively fetching 12 hours later. 

With walking, as with so much else, timing is key.

Singing Chicken

Singing Chicken

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For years I stored my oldest journals in metal boxes tucked away on the highest shelf of my closet. I had to stand on a step ladder and move so much stuff out of the way to reach them that it was as if they didn’t exist. But now they’re placed spine-side-up in the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet next to my desk, so they are ripe for exploration.

Before my discovery of Moleskine notebooks I gathered my thoughts in a hodgepodge of blank books bound in everything from leather to corduroy. The journals are a motley crew, but they served the purpose, which was connecting the dots, remembering, as Joan Didion wrote, “how it felt to be me.” 

Sometimes I dip into them for a fact: When exactly did I leave for that trip to Yugoslavia? How long did I work for the lovable but crazy family on West 94th Street? But I always read more than I intended. 

The other day, I discovered an encounter I had with a singing chicken. The “chicken” had been hired to serenade a friend and colleague on her birthday. My job was to meet the chicken and escort him to my friend’s desk. In his other life, the actor who took on this second job was playing Theseus in a production of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Or at least that’s what he told us.

You can’t make this stuff up. But, if you’re lucky, sometimes you write it down.