Almost

Winter is over.

Almost. Just barely. Light lingers. Ice cracks. Buds on your parents’ magnolia have emerged, green and fuzzy.

when the world is puddle-wonderful, e.e.cummings once wrote.

The world is slowly turning puddle-wonderful.

You’ve tapped into your animal nature these past two winters, your mind and body yielding to the gray winter days. Hibernation involves sweatshirts, and leggings, and at least five mugs because you can never be bothered to clean them. Your body has turned softer, the curves more rounded, the lines less firm. You try your best to find beauty in that, but it’s harder to appreciate your body when it’s not pulling you up mountains, when its most impressive use is supporting your laptop as you catch up on Queer Eye . You are gentle and forgiving with yourself (because that’s how Jonathan Van Ness would be).

when the world is mud-luscious…

You’ve tapped into your plant side this past winter, lying dormant for the season with books scattered around your mattress like fallen petals. You are biding your time in the soil, cooking more, learning more, creating more. You are waiting for the sunshine and warmer days when you can emerge and can scale walls, climb mountains, with your spindly stalks. You have so much energy. So much life. You are waiting.

For now.

You’ve tapped into your natural side this past year, connecting with the world in a primal and essential way. You sleep eight hours, sometimes nine, a night, and you’re surprised that you feel guilty for this, for the luxury of unfettered sleep. You wonder when you absorbed the belief that productivity and struggle were benchmarks of success, that being nourished and relaxed meant you weren’t doing enough. You live life slower these days, roughly at the pace of ice melting on the Genesee. This is how you want to live.

Winter is over.

Almost. Just barely. Spring is approaching and summer looms large.

The quiet months are behind you.

Almost.