Getting away. Getting a taste of different air, fresh textures under your toes, and new views out of strange windows. I need these things, need them like I need to breathe. I’m tempted to analyze and delve into why that is, but navel-gazing doesn’t suit a Friday night.
I need to see the horizon once in awhile. I live in a city where I can see a million sights a day, many of them new and unique and crazy-cool. Like the guys dancing on the subway last night, flipping and chanting and hat tossing, just missing my toes by an inch. But I miss the sky, the big sky that stretches down to a horizon that isn’t full of buildings and lights and nervous energy.
A sky that has room for it all, and then some. The one that takes my thoughts and tosses them into the wind, where they sometimes fly away, and sometimes come back full of hope and tasting of light. Singing in fact.
To get outside myself, my life and habits, to where the deep breaths come easy. To where the silences rest, without weight. My kids need it as much as I do. It’s the counterpoint to our daily life, and it puts it all in perspective.
After skipping town for a few days, the city feels good again. The coming home part is a hard shift to make though, when you fear that you’ll drown in options and responsibilities and habits. Then you realize that your cheeks are glowing still, your heart is lighter, and there seems to be no end to the supply of sand dusting your floors.
Drifting in the city … hanging on to that looseness and delicious fullness that comes from savoring moments, making choices, and soaking in whatever comes. Worry grates, and I see how much it colors my moods. Chips away at the peace, fragile as it is in my house of boys and cats and lessons and work.
So we read an extra chapter in the sun, make pizza and watch a movie, and reach out and touch the sky we can see. Knowing that there’s more, always more, and that what I hold in my heart is more than enough to carry me as long as I need it to.
