Even when it rains...

Today it is raining for the first time since I've been in Vermont... and even this cold downpour seems comforting from the table where I write. I've settled in enough to feel like I've been here for weeks, it feels natural and like home, though on certain corners or at certain store fronts or with the scent of certain coffee, I'm immediately transported to some moment of teenager-hood, twenty-something-hood... This city is filled with nostalgia and history, some that I'd rather forget and some that offer me comfort. But the best part of this month has been imagining myself here now, as a person who has lived a hundred places (or so), has run from the familiar at every chance I get, only to be tempted by that very  same familiar. I get to have my mom over on a tuesday afternoon and cook lunch for her...

I get to wake up and write for two hours

and then walk just outside the door and be at the waterfront, to run along Lake Champlain on a cool afternoon

to be at my brother's on a Wednesday morning and hike in to the Long Trail,

be with my family,

to write some more and then browse squash at the Farmer's market on the way home

Making and sticking to a schedule has been the hardest part. It is a different kind of work I'm doing. Writing is a solitary, self-directed, internal, reflective, physically draining, yet of course infinitely fulfilling kind of work, but it is so different from most of my days for the past many years, immersed in the energy and chaos and constant fast-forward pace of a high school. I actually honestly do love both worlds, but this has been a tough one to settle into, though once I do, and I am lost in the writing, its an amazing thing. I've been hit with inspiration on a new project, unfolding my current project, and trying not to think about how limited this time is. But limited or not, it's mine. I'm working on a story I hope to post a piece of in the next few days. This rainy afternoon is perfect for it.