Letters from Islamorada - Day .5

A Series

The difference in temperature was felt the moment I stepped from the plane to the ramp; my sweater and scarf were incompatible with the humidity. Baggage claim, rental car - air conditioning. So strange considering four short hours before, I was standing in Washington DC unable to stay warm.

The drive from Miami to Islamorada clocked in at about two hours, mostly because of the construction on the freeway and "island traffic" once we entered the Keys. Palm trees. Tropical colors. Single-lane roads. Signs proclaiming "the best (insert activity - diving, boating, fishing, snorkeling) in the Keys!"

Traffic slowed as we approached an art show. Little white tent-booths dotting the roadside. Music. Palm trees, everywhere. We decided to check into the house, drop the luggage, and head back to the grocery store for supplies. On the way, we would stop at the art show.

A few miles further south and a left turn led us to Moorings Village.










We checked in and drove to Eyster House. Please note: the map is quite deceiving; everything is a five-minute walk to the beach - where the aquamarine (or green, or grey, as the day dictates) Atlantic barely laps at the sugary sand. The reefs surrounding the Keys prevent the water from actually breaking in waves; instead, the ocean appears like a majestic sheet of indescribable glass, twinkling in the sunlight, and hardly announcing its presence through the tranquil whispering of the palm trees.

Eyster House sleeps four comfortably and is quintessential island living: bare wood floors, exposed nail heads, white plantation shutters at all the windows, verandas, lanais, porches, balconies, Adirondack chairs and light, airy colors. A few steps down from our veranda was a sandy path leading to the pool and beyond, the beach. It looked and felt like heaven, only a little more humid.

We dropped our bags and headed back to the art show. I met and talked with artists and jewelers who were astonishingly friendly and kind; it was a pleasure to look at their wares and make purchases directly from them.

The Winn-Dixie was a treat - aisle after aisle of wine inside the store. Maryland is such a nightmare when it comes to separation of food and booze; the Winn-Dixie really knows how to do it well. Our cart overflowed with food and drink for the week, and I pored over the produce - you could smell the sweet tangy aroma of the pineapple and the melon from feet away.

Relaxing wasn't an option, it was an imperative. Within hours of being in the Keys, I could feel the pressure and tension of home and work just slip away. It sounds so cliche, and there's no other way to describe it. The languid and relaxed pace of life in the Keys doesn't request your adherence, it demands your compliance. In an extremely friendly way and with a smile, of course.

So, This is the New Year.

I'm no fan of resolutions. However, I woke up this morning with five things in mind, things that I intend to do in the new year.

After all, it's 2010, the year of possibility, so why not set intentions? I have incredibly good feelings about this year, because now foundations exist that were previously unavailable to us - foundations that permit the creation of things that were otherwise elusive to us. It's a year of building dreams. A year of success and prosperity and achievement. A year in which everything we thought we knew evolves into something much greater than we could have imagined.

1. Make time every day for myself to improve my overall health and well-being. This will take the form of some kind of exercise or other movement for at least 30 minutes. I will also strive to start meditating again. And write more consistently.

2. Be an agent of change. In the new year, I will stop dismissing everything that presents an obstacle as "stupid." It's unfair of me to say that over and over and over again when what I really should do is have the courage to understand, not dismiss. Only through understanding can there be change.

3. Find and do work that I love. Instead of pouring some small percentage of my talent and my skills into a job that I like well enough about four days a year and tolerate (poorly, I might add) the rest of the time, I think it's time to find and do work that inspires me and helps others. I've been taking incremental steps toward this change, and now, it's time to fully realize it.

4. Embrace opportunity. I need to change my perspective and stop looking at opportunities for why they won't work, examining them instead to see all the reasons they make sense for me.

5. Choose love over fear.

Thanksgiving

My cat woke me a couple of hours ago. His paw, my cheek. The alarm clock I prefer, only not so early. We finally settled into rest; neither of us sleeping. His tail on my pillow, and when I spoke to him, he flicked it as an acknowledgement, batting my forehead with its fluffy, fox-softness.

My father's birthday. A son born at Thanksgiving. No one then could predict the short trajectory of his life. My head clearer, I see life through his easy eyes, more with his sense of humor and kindness. It's good to feel him coursing through my veins.

My family is fractured now more than ever before. Sister, brother-in-law scattered to different apartments, familiar furniture in new places, forging ahead in an unexpected, unplanned world, each on their own. My love for them is unchanged. They both deserve happiness and goodness in this world, and I know they will find it.

Is it the human condition to struggle, to suffer? I examine the people in my orbit - some closer and some very distant - and I wonder. Is strife the natural state of progress? So much unhappiness. So much unrest. Why are some at peace in stillness and some at peace only in chaos? I have come to accept that sometimes, happiness is found in the darkest, coldest, and dankest of places. Who am I to judge where one finds solace and comfort?

Fog this morning, blanketing my neighborhood, curling up against the windows and diffusing all the light.

Grateful. Grateful for things I cannot find Words to describe. Filled with appreciation for everything I have had and have lost and everything I have and have yet to know.

This year, life is good.

Life is good.

You Fit Into Me

You fit into me
like a hook into an eye

a fish hook
an open eye


~ Margaret Atwood

Focus

November pulls at me. A month of births that remind me only of death - loss, change, grief, and longing. Reflecting on all the milestones of life, I remember the moments of new beginnings with the most clarity. That strong, driving sensation deep within my being of knowing with a kind of surreal lucidity that something amazing was taking shape. And the twin feeling of something being torn apart, just at the very moment of its coming together. For without death, birth cannot occur. Life's pains are that much more precious because it is finite, not infinite. We are all caught in this web of impermanence. Nothing lasts and therefore everything should be cherished that much more. Binah, the great and terrible Mother of us all; the life-giver and death-dealer.

November. A melancholy month gracefully wandering toward Thanksgiving and ushering in the winter solstice. My father's birthday is ten days away. He would be 65 years old this year. He died when he was 42. Too young. Too much life left to live.

We had a beautiful autumn. The rainy days of the summer gave us a long, fiery cotillion of bright orange, yellow, and scarlet. I caught so many leaves in mid-transformation, their stem and base still gorgeously green, and the tips beginning to burn, as if lit ablaze by an errant match. Everything is browning now, crunching under foot and scuttling along sidewalks in the chilling breeze.

My thoughts turn to New England, to the years I spent there, to the way winter would blanket everything in snow and if you listened very closely, you can hear the flakes landing softly on the drifts. In November, I drove my little car fast along the twisting lanes, through the Berkshires, sometimes stopping to pick apples, sometimes stopping to breathe in the smell of burning leaves and fireplaces. I climbed Mount Sugarloaf's observation deck and looked out over the valley, wondering things, secret things. My favorite part of venturing out was returning to the warmth of my home, where everything outside retreated far away from the sanctuary of my space.

Ticking clock. Sunlight moving across the floor in shapes dictated by the windowpanes. Strong black tea in the mug beside me.

When I look back at this life, what will I see?

Where will my feet have walked, and where will my heart have led me?

What work will I have done to make something better in this world?

Who will be with me through the long journey, and who will be memories, faded like worn photographs in a book?