I can tell it's September because I'm listening to fall music. Without conscious forethought, the soundtrack changes. Nighttime lingers longer, the air cools, dampens. And I'm riding to the cafe in the pre-dawn chill, listening to Lou Barlow and All-time Quarterback.
The summer has washed past in a flurry of sunsets and cupcakes, lakeside picnics and mountainview drives. This was the longest sabbatical I've ever taken from blogging in the past six years. I missed it. I kept feeling like I was forgetting to do something.
Breaking the seal here again is daunting. Like a long-distance friend whose phone calls you screen because the responsibility of bringing them up-to-date on your life is overwhelming. Like the first run after a decadent Thanksgiving holiday. Like three days' worth of dishes in the sink.
I thought taking a break would open up time and energy that I could invest elsewhere, but I'm beginning to see that's scarcity thinking. Creativity is not limited. In fact, it's like exercise; the more you do, the better you get and the more you desire it.
It's the "shoulds" that drown me. As soon as a task is relegated to "should" status, it loses its charm and becomes a burden. If I ignore the burden, it becomes paralysis. The other day I was ranting about Things I Should Be Doing, and VVB said, "You're shoulding all over the place!"
Let's remove the word "should" from the English language. "Should" is a weighted, multi-layered word that can only spell trouble. Take this example: late Saturday morning sprawled quite comfortably in bed, the question arises: "Should we get up?"
Now, "shall we" implies an invitation, and "could we" is a question of logistics. But "should we" implies some invisible jury lurking in the shadows, imposing their moral judgment on my eagerness to lounge another hour in sin. Could we get up? Yes. Should we get up? Probably. Do I want to get up? Hell no.
In any case, eliminating the "should" from my writing agenda changes my world view from one of scarcity to one of abundance. I can update, and I will do so whenever I damn well please.
NaNoWriMo is fast approaching. I anticipate it with a mix of titillation and dread. It's an insane undertaking but par for the course. I had some ideas flitting about my brain, mostly dreams I've had - images flickering across my lobes. At Band of Horses on Saturday, a boy asked his girl to marry him in between songs. My eyes flooded. It was perfect. Perfect as the image of a girl alone in a garage, smashing a guitar in her flip flops, feeling like an adulteress. Perfect as sunset lying palm to palm, ankle-deep in Alki sand.
I still spend my mornings at the Cafe, and I suspect that's where I'll write my novel. I'm homesick for the Someday Cafe lately, though the term "homesick" is no longer accurate. It's faded into garden-variety nostalgia. I was missing the crisp bricked streets of Harvard Sq. last week, September in Cambridge (a good book title, sequel to "August in Winter Hill"), falafel in Central Sq., the deep underground smell of the Harvard T stop.
But then I wonder if I miss Cambridge in actuality, or I miss how I saw it then, who I was. Because life in the Aloha Cabana is absolutely stellar right now, and my plans for the fall brewing like mulled cider, and I am still in love with Seattle after all these years - the millions of tiny charms that tickle me daily, still reeling over an August sunset behind the Space Needle, or the overgrown verdant tunnels of Queen Anne, or the mismatched gingerbread houses of Capitol Hill. The scene never gets old for me. I soak up Broadway on a Friday night, taking that route home even when it's unnecessary, because riding through the thick of it inspires me and makes me feel like I belong there - like I'm home.
And even now I can be nostalgic for last fall, in all its torrid insanity and upheaval. I was reading my journal from last September and felt a pang - compassion for myself, marked with a fleck of envy at being so wide open, even if it had been a painful ripping that got me there. Cease to Begin on my chunky headphones, the leaves gathering on the Blaine St. stairs as I walked to work, drinking homemade coffee with pumpkin spice creamer, sometimes angry that the Stella was out of commission and sometimes grateful to have an excuse to wander meditatively in the misty morning.
So maybe "missing" isn't any more accurate than "homesick" - maybe I'm just remembering and appreciating a time that was colorful and alive. Even if the giant Now is just as rich.
And arms outstretched
I embrace
the fall.
RSS: subscribe to feed