The changing of seasons always makes space for reflection, at least for me. Today it's thirty degrees and Spring was here a week ago. But today Winter popped back in to say, "Not yet. Slow down." I've been thinking a lot about how I want to get my shit together, whatever that means. After a winter of deconstruction, of things falling apart, it comes time to rebuild. This time stronger. This time carrying lessons, experience.

I've been reading lots of Mary Oliver. I love Mary Oliver. If I could choose a lady to adopt as, like, a guru or something, she would be it. I keep worrying about time. About how I want to be in a certain place and feel like I'm grasping and seeing it but not quite knowing where to reach. So I go to good old Mary and open her latest collection. She begins with this:

Don’t Worry

Things take the time they take. Don’t

worry.

How many roads did St. Augustine follow

before he became St. Augustine?

And just like that I get a little nervous because it seems like Mary is in my head but she gives me the words I need. The universe does that a lot, and sometimes it freaks me out, but in a good way. And I realize, yet again, that nothing is under our control and that’s okay. We do what we do. We work hard at something. We practice. And then we let go. I struggle with that…all…the…time…Maybe that’s why that one time I got a massage the man actually yelled at me, sweat dripping down his forehead, “Why are your shoulders so tight? You do something about that!!!!” Hmm…Yes. Letting go.

Tonight I walked in the cold from the East Village down Mott Street to Chinatown to meet my warm friends for dim sum. One of my favorite Simon and Garfunkel songs came on, 59th Street Bridge Song, and it was one of those times when you’re walking and full of energy because, look around you and look at all the different parts of this city I’m going through and isn’t that awesome, and then Simon sings (I’m pretty sure it wasn’t Garfunkel), “Slow down, you move too fast/ You got to make the morning last/Just kicking down the cobblestones/Looking for fun and feeling groovy/Ba da-da da-da da-da, feeling groovy.” And, really, that’s all there is to it. Life is groovy. Let’s be here.