Odd, how we are. A day apart from the kids, and I'm adrift. Sometimes launching into some kind of declaration. "We're different, because we're forty, and we knew each other when we were twenty, and what we need as adults is far different from what was then. Our security means that we need something different. We're figuring out what it is." And he seems to agree, I suppose. But doesn't want to reply, not really.
We took down the tree and lights. Starting to clear out the house from the frenzy of the holidays. This is actually one of my favorite parts of the holiday cycle, when the house returns to what it was and what will really fit. It's like the cobwebs are swept and the anxiety can clear. I shall vacuum soon.
Feeling like I will be very productive when going back to work. I'm ready. Sort of energized. Nothing looms except the lingering oddness of this particular holiday.
It is extremely windy today. Reminds me of home and Colorado, where it is about three times windier than this. There's not as much atmosphere, of course, so the wind can actually reach speeds in excess of 120 mph easily. It blows steadily down from the mountains in a great whoosh. Makes everyone speedy and strange from the ions. Here it is different, far more moist, more the feeling of being hit by a wall of air, and it is live with more of a palpable presence. The air in Colorado can tend to wisp by despite the force of the gale.
People are surprised by my Wind in Boulder stories. Only if you've lived there do you know. Every once in a while it takes the walls off perfectly sturdy houses. Always our backyard littered with pieces of other people's roofs in January.
Were you with us that time when we were at the hot tub place that had the tubs on the roof and we were soaking as we watched all this debris flying overhead? I think we were sophmores in high school then.
Posted by: Ms. Jane | January 03, 2006 at 07:57 AM
I remember those tubs. I met my first Unitarian there. Naked youth group meetings. For some reason I took an immediate liking to their brand of religion.
Tubbing when it snowed out -- heavenly.
Posted by: 'mouse | January 03, 2006 at 09:13 AM
I worked there!
Posted by: Jo | January 03, 2006 at 09:16 AM
Naked Unitarian hot tub meetings? Hmmm. I've been thinking of trying something new this year. Tell me more.
Posted by: Keith | January 03, 2006 at 09:37 AM
Dude, I'm totally not in that Unitarian cult! ::ducking & running::
Posted by: Ms. Jane | January 03, 2006 at 11:34 AM
Now it may be that UU's, like so much of this sad, rightward-lurching country, have gotten more conservative, but in my dated, Boulder/1980s experience it went like this:
a) find Unitarian or several
b) suggest discussing deep philosophical and/or spiritual issues in a rooftop hottub under the stars
c) take off clothes
d) discuss issues of spirituality, politics, etc.
e) repeat
Lovely people, all of them.
I know, I know, my brushstrokes are broad. Your results may vary. But I'd hope not.
Posted by: 'mouse | January 03, 2006 at 11:59 AM
It's a hoarded secret that UU Inner Sanctum Meetings always take place in the nude. Now that the secret's out, you all have to be... reprogrammed...
Posted by: Jo | January 03, 2006 at 01:14 PM