i am ready for that and weary of this

Tomorrow the movers come. Today Genevieve walked around our mostly-packed apartment and complained, "everything keeps disappearing." Disappearing into brown cardboard boxes that my mother has diligently continued to fill, despite the fact that I don't really want everything packed up. I dislike the transition, not knowing where the fingernail clippers are—or my phone or favorite sweater. I linger about the apartment, soaking in the space I love so much. Dismantling it perhaps a bit too slowly. Each day I've been taking photos from my bedroom window of the locust trees blooming above the Hudson, the Palisades peeking through the foliage. I will miss the trees and the river, the sunsets, and shadowy sunrises, the hawks and gulls. I will miss this little space full of light and peace, even as I won't miss the garbage-laden sidewalks, rushing pedestrians and honking cars, the tiresome culture of competition. 

I am looking forward to getting into our car on Saturday and driving west. Of course, our drive across the country is living in transition as well, but the decisions have mostly been made. Where to go, what to wear, where to sleep. There are many friends to see, and sights to show the children: the Magnificent Mile in Chicago, the vast flatness of Kansas, the mountains in Colorado, the Grand Canyon, the Redwoods. And then the drive up 101 to Oregon. I am ready for that, and am I weary of this.

So I am excited (if not still a bit anxious) the movers are coming tomorrow morning. I am looking forward to the responsibility for all these possessions weighing on someone else's shoulders for awhile. And then just be the four of us, a suitcase, and a car.

copper beech

An august copper beech tree presides behind my office. It dangles furry red nuttish things at the tips of its branches. I swiped one because it looked soft in the humid air.

In case my readership of six is worried that I'm beside myself with a broken heart, really it's not so. I get it, you know, that waiting for what is right--truly right--is the deal. The problem is that in the meantime I get impatient and lonely.

Once Jenny said that when she brushes her teeth it depresses her because she imagines herself brushing her teeth every morning and night for the rest of her life. I tend to think of loneliness the same way, although it's not as funny. But I never experience loneliness in the moment the way I experience it when I imagine it stretching on dully for the rest of my life.

But my cooper beech is an icon of that which stretches on, growing deeper and spreading out, and she is neither lonely nor dull. And she's making furry red things to wear.