Life Infusing

I had a really great weekend. Rain, poets, lunch with new friends, dinner with old friends, Hitchcock movies, and a life-infusing walk in Central Park. The temperature has finally started going down and I am thrilled. I love brisk weather. I look better in jackets and scarves than I do in sweat and tanktops. Note to self: everytime I resist something it means I should absolutely do it. Yesterday Graham wanted to get out and do. I had already gone out and done a lot on Saturday, and had intentions to stay at home and do arty & homey stuff. Yet, something pulled at me. Reluctantly, I gave in and we went for a long walk in Central Park. Ah, CENTRAL PARK! There is something seriously expanding to this place. Not only is it old, but there is something about it--I hesitate to use the word 'magic' because I use it so often in here--but it is filled with an incredible energy to it.

The leaves are beginning to change. I picked some up and put them in my journal. Schoolbus yellow and fiery red. We watched two small, white dogs greet eachother and then run with such gusto, muzzle to muzzle, we were doubled over cracking up at the sight. On the way out, we pass by the throngs at the Strawberry Fields memorial, and then the flickering lamps of the Dakota. We go to our favorite diner and eat the best cheeseburgers and onion rings on the planet. After a long, cold walk the salt and greese is heaven.

On our way to the subway, I delight in the easy bubble blowing of Bazooka Joe bubble gum--all hail Bazooka Joe! He is a cheap thrill--free at the diner, and only lasting in flavor for about fifteen minutes, but I blow such bubbles, and suck them back in, that it reminds me of those pleasures you did as a kid, like jumprope, or the swings. It STILL feels good to swing and it still feels good to blow a big bubble.

These are the things that I am thinking lately: Have I been risking enough in my creative endeavors or have I been playing it safe? It seems to me, the happiest I've ever been creatively, are the times I have been involved with a community of artists, who share their work--not these last years that I have been mostly alone. Do I want to go back to school? What would my ideal day job be?

And so I come back to work today, and there are things to be done. The rain is going to fall and I am going to love it. Graham and I may go back to the park next weekend to follow the leaves' progression. I remember last year I came to visit Graham in October, and we walked in Central Park, at the peak of color. It was like a painting or a storybook. We couldn't believe how bright and surreal it was. Did I know then I was going to be in New York? No, I didn't know. I was trying it on inside, thinking, would this fit? And for some reason it eventually did seem like a good fit and so here I am. What will next October look like? God only knows.