It’s colder out than I want it to be. Not window-scraping weather, yet, but I can feel it’s coming. Geese are flying in v-formations low across the sky. Recently, there was a lazy circle of storks flying over our neighborhood. They looked so weird, alien, almost. Then they turned in unison and flew north. The storks we have here were supposed to be raised and then released to migrate to Africa each winter. Instead they stay. Every stork I see reinforces a feeling of wonder about where I live.
It’s crazy season. Can you feel how fast everything is going? The leaves are speeding from the trees and each morning I simply want to burrow deeper into my duvet nest but the insistent alarm drags me up almost before I have time to rebel. It’s all linear and circular at the same time. Moving forward through the year, and spiraling around. Here comes winter, holidays, Christmas, a seasonal shift; ending and beginning all over again.
Time to reflect is what I lack most right now. Instead, I’m jumping from one rock to the next, trying simply to keep my balance as I cross my days. There are papers strewn haphazardly across the desk. Books lie spine-cramped on the footstool, on the side table, on the arm of the sofa. I haven’t written my family in…days? weeks? too long, obviously. I haven’t called my friends. I haven’t stopped by and said hello. Hello!
Mostly, I’m peering past the present. It’s a failing I’ve long fallen victim to: living in the future when I should be savoring the now. I stop and slow and turn. Around again, and look: there! My children have grown again. My house needs cleaning. There! Something needs to be done. Something else needs to be done, too. I turn around and turn around again, and there is always something waiting on the other side.