n. Wanderlust; lit. “farsickness”; “an ache for the distance”
You go here too often; you do, you know? Sometimes, you think change or leaving is the only way to be resilient. Like exercising the ability to give up and give away is building the only strong muscle that matters. Here’s what you ought to do today. You ought to wake up early and take the plod out of your step. Find a lightness, find the kind of energy that lifts the sooty toes and heels of little feet; mine it. Yesterday, you almost posted this old Wings song, because it seemed right - something is in the air, something is coming, bands are on the run! But then you got distracted and annoyed by the process of waiting for life At having days where the wellspring turned up dust not water and you can be so damn impatient. And what good has it ever done you.
You ought to stop and find a tiny bouquet of hyacinths for your friend’s birthday and remember that life is changing for her. Life is really changing and if you slowed down, you could probably read it on the slowly falling faces of half the men and women you know. You probably ought to look around this city and consider that this expiring summer malaise is an epidemic; it will pass. It will pass if we let it. Throw it up like that giant parachute in 4th gym class where you lived in terror of forgetting your tennis shoes and being forced to spend the entire day sweating through the hall in navy moon boots.
Billow it up and let’s all run out of it together.
You ought to look for 13 reasons that this day is ludicrous with promise. You ought to be excited that there are any stories in your head at all, even if they gin up with a spark and snuff right out in a breeze. There is time for character development.
What you are saying is, it’s time to find and rally the troops. It is nearly fall now and summer feels feckless and insolent behind you. Maybe this day is the perfect day to stop and start again, born-again-gracious. Maybe it’s time to look around. Smile because someone left a soft old shirt in your laundry and you’ll fold it and soon, return it. Let your face soften too because something outside is blooming and someone walks by your bedroom window snapping. Snapping at 6 am, truly.
So day by day and let’s not get down. Let’s stop worrying about how the world is treating you; that must be irrelevant. You only have eyes for treetops, but it seems everything must start in the roots. Let’s grapple our hands back down to the roots. Draw out a map, not for leaving but for planning. There is time enough to do it right, to take ourselves less seriously or more seriously. To get there. Maybe this isn’t the month for new camps yet; maybe the call before us is just to reinvent the drill. Stretch out. We begin it all today.
