It Snows Here

It’s snowing here. I think about calling to tell you this, but I don’t call you anymore. It sounds like that Drake song, but it’s because Drake knows the truth. I could see the snow coming down through the sky lights in my attic bedroom. Does it snow in Tennessee? It is no wonder to me the nine years in California blended together. Without seasons how are we reminded time is passing? It’s how I got tricked into sticking around for so long. Though, most days I’d like to go back. There is a difference, and I do not know what it is; between having a good life and having the right life for yourself. 

I was drinking last night in the same bar I drink in ever Tuesday night. I sit alone for a little while before meeting a friend, and I order a glass of red wine. It’s the kind of place where you can think about yourself retrospectively. I do a lot of that here. “When I was in graduate school and lived in Idaho.” She’s already brighter and more hopeful than I am. The snow is coming down in fast-fat flakes and I can make them all out individually. 

A friend asked me last night the same kinds of things she has been asking me for years. I wonder if we are dealt a bundle of questions and asked to spend our life time chewing them over. Everyone is very worried about what to do. But, being worried about what to do is the answer. It means there is something to do. It means there is something for change. I wish we could be as excited for ourselves when it knocks on the door as we are for other people. But the knock is so scary. 

In the fall I was on a walk in this neighborhood now being covered in snow. We walked a lot. A wise friend told me how excited she was for me. She said this while I was nearly on my knees in pain, begging for a life I’d been forced to give up. I was incapable of seeing beyond what I’d lost, beyond what I thought I wanted. But, she was right. I get excited now for anyone who is forced to change. How do we know that time is passing unless we do so?