There is a man downtown who always carries a stuffed snowman. The snowman is almost two feet tall, and he has it wrapped in clothes, with a striped beanie on its head. I have seen this man with the snowman many, many times, and still, every time I see him, I think he is carrying a baby, and still, every time I see him, it startles me. "Is that... Oh. Right. The snowman."
...
At lunch today, A. and I sat outside, talking, as we do, about how we feel like we are on the edge of something. Something is about to change, but we don't know what.
"A woman from my church was telling me that she feels the same way," A. said, "And I told her that my friends and I have all been talking about that feeling."
"Uh oh," I said, "I hope she hasn't been feeling that way for 40 years or something."
"Yeah, that's the problem," she said.
So we sat there, munching our favorite meal of the week, a cheap, road-side food tradition that we've been trading off paying for (which I can very nearly afford now that my law school loan situation has been resolved - avoid law school, folks!), and thinking about a country that we both miss.
I've been feeling this way for a while, like anything could happen, like I could wake up tomorrow and find that I'm living a different life. It scares me and exhilarates me and yet sometimes I wonder if this is how people get stuck: they think that life could change at any moment, without them doing anything, and so they don't change anything themselves. They just wait for it.
I'm not ready for change, not quite yet, but I also know how these things go. I can't wake up in late October as the days are getting miserably short and suddenly decide to move someplace warmer. And so I'm doing the work now, hoping that something comes through at just the right time to spare me from another long, hermit-like winter further north than humans were ever intended to live.
...
At lunch today, A. and I sat outside, talking, as we do, about how we feel like we are on the edge of something. Something is about to change, but we don't know what.
"A woman from my church was telling me that she feels the same way," A. said, "And I told her that my friends and I have all been talking about that feeling."
"Uh oh," I said, "I hope she hasn't been feeling that way for 40 years or something."
"Yeah, that's the problem," she said.
So we sat there, munching our favorite meal of the week, a cheap, road-side food tradition that we've been trading off paying for (which I can very nearly afford now that my law school loan situation has been resolved - avoid law school, folks!), and thinking about a country that we both miss.
I've been feeling this way for a while, like anything could happen, like I could wake up tomorrow and find that I'm living a different life. It scares me and exhilarates me and yet sometimes I wonder if this is how people get stuck: they think that life could change at any moment, without them doing anything, and so they don't change anything themselves. They just wait for it.
I'm not ready for change, not quite yet, but I also know how these things go. I can't wake up in late October as the days are getting miserably short and suddenly decide to move someplace warmer. And so I'm doing the work now, hoping that something comes through at just the right time to spare me from another long, hermit-like winter further north than humans were ever intended to live.
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