dark

Safety, etc., I know, but I love walking through the neighborhoods of this city at night. 

I love walking through them in daylight, too. That's what summer evenings are for. Summer evenings are friendly and communal, with people out walking their dogs and mowing their lawns. 

Winter evenings are for wandering in the quiet dark, feeling like the world is mine alone. I used to feel lonely sometimes, seeing people move behind their lighted windows. Now I feel self-contained. I am enough.

I was talking on the phone to a friend today as I walked, and I mentioned something I copied down a couple of months ago, from an interview with Reese Witherspoon in which she talked about playing Cheryl Strayed in the movie Wild.

"We save ourselves," she said. "Every woman knows it. Every man knows it. You look up. Nobody's coming to the rescue. It's a universal story. But it's revolutionary in the way that a woman is allowed to tell it." (No More Ms. Nice Gal, New York Times, 10/29/14)

That's what this last year has been for me, and that's why I am happy to walk alone in the dark.