Isn’t it crazy when things begin to align and you realize that, oh, that thing you did when you were eight and then kept doing until you were sixteen, and then stopped doing for a while, and then started again, wasn’t all for nothing? It’s like, all of a sudden a picture comes into focus but you realize that it’s really not all of a sudden. That it’s a plumage of time spent doing that thing and that thing was for a reason.

I’ve had a glass and a half of wine and have been working all day. It was the second mild day we’ve had since November and my neighbor across the street, Marie, emerged in her muumuu to sit on the stoop like she’s done for the past thirty-five years, I’m told. Marie tells us that there will be ice cream and kids and crickets soon enough.

So that’s how it is. The winter is long and then when Spring comes we forget that our bones were creaky and we swore we couldn’t spend another cold season here. We forget things easily. At least I do. And then there’s a waft of spice from the apartment below, or the musky cologne on that man you just walked by on the street. It hurls you back to that night in Seville when you yelled at the first man you loved because you hadn't told him yet that you loved him and didn’t quite know how to. It all seems to come out of nowhere. And then you remember that you have all of these things inside of you and all you need are gentle reminders to push you back, to realign.