Vacancy

We clean. We sneeze through dust clouds and wade through the years of trinkets piled into this tiny Greenwich village apartment. The big interior design site wants to come by to photograph our home, and it doesn't take long to realize how much grime remains in corners unseen. She frets, I delight in the open windows, the higher ceilings. Daylight savings tricks me into thinking the day is young, and I adore forgetting dinner, weariness, while my hands smell of softsoap and clean.

She erases every trace of me in the bedroom, and I let her. How proud she is of her home. We joke of the madness of the house, squirrels on the fire escape and santa clause salt shakers in March. In the end it's an apartment 25 years in the making; we are who we are, with all our eccentricities. I go into her apartment and I think how much potential it has, if only... she says of the neighbor, and perhaps that's how we all feel. How much easier to find flaws in others, to say why don't they just..?, and how hard to do the same for oneself.

I roll silently in my self-righteousness before I try to shake it off, again. In the end, it's too lovely an opportunity to revel in the clear windows and polished porcelain, to waste time making yours what is not.

Burst

And in an instant, how it all is transformed. Where did these buds come from? Surely they weren't there yesterday in the cold March rain. We run around the playground with our jackets open and stare into the sun without reservation. Every branch is teeming with sticky little clusters of Life in the making; I awoke to the sound of birds months gone.

How simple it is, the change. Life rushes so quickly back into my veins, into every fiber of my pale, weary body, and I feel it tickle my nerves as it comes. The heavy eyelids and tired limbs seem months away, the dark corners where I let my soul huddle through the dark months are long gone, and all that's left are dust bunnies along the walls, exposed by the bright light streaming in.

I grab a dishrag, find some soap, and I set about scouring the remnants of winter, from my heart.

of Sand and Sea

Such a sunny Sunday; when I woke up, my window was open, and mild, cool air wafted in over my warm bed. I can only assume I had opened it in my sleep earlier that night. After a week of procrastination, finally I collected my quarters and went to do laundry, to wash the clothes of my trip. For so long I had put it off, reluctant to rid them of their salt and sand. My gawdily colorful beach towel came out smelling of clean, soft, dryer sheets and it made me sad. I left the trip behind. We couldn't throw it out, said my mother of the sand, we emptied it into the flower pot. My mother is not one for nostalgia. Such is our love for Australia.

Meanwhile, orphan puppy has taken to sleeping in my bed. I allow my sleep to be interrupted, inconvenienced. I find myself postponing things on my to-do list in order to bury her in love that will mend her broken heart. I upend my every container of tenderness on her for the last few days she is with us, seemingly doling out more affection the nearer the farewell comes.

Typical.

It is easier to love what I know will not last. This is no comment of the safety of objects lost.

I just tire so quickly, of commitments.