Yesterday was the Feast of the Epiphany, a day I’ve always liked, though not so much for its liturgical meaning as for its philosophical one: “a sudden, intuitive perception; an insight into the reality or essential meaning of something.”
When I was younger I considered epiphanies the “ah hah” moments in life, grandiose and breath-taking. But as I’ve grown older I’ve realized they are more common than I once thought. They are part of the wisdom that comes with age. They are moments when I say to myself, “Oh, so that’s what it’s all about.” They are not always pleasant, but they are always true.
Yesterday afternoon after work I walked to the containment pond. It was cold and calm, and once I reached the pond, I pulled the earphones out of my ears. I wanted to walk without distraction.
The pond was so full of life in the spring and summer, buzzing with insects. Now it is clogged with cattails that have dried and turned brittle. There was a seasonal lesson here I could better contemplate in silence.
I’ve always thought it would be boring to exercise on a track, to walk in circles, but yesterday I saw the point of it — because each round brings a new revelation. There is a peacefulness that comes from such repetitive movement, a cleansing.
I only made one loop yesterday. But I’ll go back to the pond soon to search for its quiet center.
With two kids in college and one in high school, hanging out together is a matter of timing and luck. Someone goes out later than she had planned; another stays in. Tom and I go to bed later than we would otherwise. Eventually, we all end up in the kitchen.
We don’t do anything special: We laugh, complain, roll our eyes, hug, nag, eat a bowl of cereal and go our separate ways.
But these moments are what I remember when we’re apart.
There is, first of all, the hour. In the holiday house, 5 a.m. is firmly in the “night” category. Now it is unequivocally morning.
Next are the clothes. I can’t pull on a pair of black stretch pants and an old sweatshirt. There are skirts and boots to consider, makeup to wear.
And now, in a few minutes, comes the commute. It, above all, separates days off from days “on.” I often think how different my life would be if I jumped in a car and drove 15 minutes to an office, parked and went in. Instead, I drive, park, walk, ride Metro, switch to another Metro line, ride two stops and then walk some more. Total time: one hour 10 minutes on the way in and one hour 30 on the way home.
The commute has a life of its own. It is a force to be reckoned with. Especially on re-entry day.
I’ve always thought January 2 a less than savory date. The universal going-back-to-school (and work) after the holidays date. This year most of us got a one-day reprieve, so today is the day of reckoning.
Suddenly the world seems dark and cold again. Holiday lights are down, boxed up till next year. Christmas trees line the street, stripped of their decorations, with only a few forlorn scraps of tinsel or a forgotten ornament or two as evidence of their former glory.
It seems a good, contrary move then to post a Christmas photo, a shot of our kitchen table, the sun streaming in, the warmth of the season captured.
I look for fresh starts throughout the year, so when I’m handed one as obvious as New Year’s Day I’d rather downplay the thing. It’s hard to this year, however, with such a splendid date to contemplate — this string of ones, nice tidy digits, straight arrows pointing us toward the future.
And that’s what today is about, of course — the future, moving ahead whether we’re ready to or not. Moving ahead with optimism and purpose, with a list of resolutions tattered from folding and unfolding, one we drag out every year and check off an item or two a year if we’re lucky.
December 31 usually finds me taking stock of the old year and making resolutions for the new. This year is no exception. But there is a big difference. This year I actually kept one of my resolutions — I started a blog.
I’d thought about blogging for years, but last New Year’s was the first time I resolved to start one — and without the back-to-back blizzards we had in February, A Walker in the Suburbs might be just another “worry less” or “exercise more” — one of those good intentions I carry quietly into the next year.
But it wasn’t. And it has given me more than I could have hoped. After a career of writing for editors — and being an editor — this blog is blissfully editor-free. Well, almost. There’s still the little devil who sits on my shoulder and whispers in my ear: “Do you want to reveal so much?” or “How could you leave that out?” But even that bothersome editor, self doubt, is less intrusive than she used to be.
I started A Walker in the Suburbs not knowing where it would lead or even how often I would post. And it has surprised and encouraged me. Thanks to all of you who stop by this little corner of the blogosphere. May your resolutions come true, too.
Yesterday I traveled to Maryland to see my parents, who are visiting from Kentucky. My mother is starting a museum; my father is planning his next Eighth Air Force reunion. They are proof that getting older is not just about loss; it may also be about gain.
Mom and Dad are children of the Depression — but they are not depressed. They come from an era where people largely stayed in their hometowns, where most interaction was face-to-face. They are old enough to tell it like it is. After I’m with them I feel clear-headed and strong. I feel optimistic.
The winter walk is full of sounds: the cawing of crows, the whir of a distant chainsaw, the crunch of frozen ground underfoot. Along the woods path are pockets of crunchiness, where leaves have splintered and crumbled, become packed and moistened and are now brittle and fun to pop.
I think of winter as a silent season — and it is. But try as hard as I might, the fall of foot on land is never noiseless.
My office is closed, the year is winding down. I wake up and realize: There is no place I have to be, nothing I have to do. And so, I read.
I just finished Let’s Take the Long Way Home by Gail Caldwell. Subtitled “A Memoir of Friendship,” it chronicles the author’s relationship with the late Caroline Knapp. I read Knapp’s book Drinking: A Love Story a while ago and enjoyed it so much I immediately searched for other books she’d written. I was sad to learn of her death of lung cancer at age 42. Especially sad because Knapp had beaten anorexia and alcoholism — only to be beaten by cancer.
I approached Caldwell’s book warily at first, since she covers ground Knapp covered in her writing — addiction to alcohol, love of dogs. But I warmed to the author and to the friendship she shared with Knapp and by the end of the book was completely hooked. By sharing her fears and her inside jokes and even her occasional spats with Knapp, Caldwell brings her friend to life, the slant of Knapp’s back as she rowed on the Charles River, her habit of playing computer solitaire during a boring phone conversation.
Like all good memoirs, though, the book is about much more than the subjects at hand. It is ultimately a lens through which we view ourselves and those we love.
“Every story in life worth holding on to has to have a spirit line. You can call this hope or tomorrow or the ‘and then’ of narrative itself, but without it — without that bright, dissonant fact of the unknown, of what we cannot control — consciousness and everything with it would tumble inward and implode. The universe insists that what is fixed is also finite.”
