Breathless
Long gone are the days when I floated up a flight of stairs, taking the steps two at a time; and it is not of youthful days that I speak, but a time only prior to six years ago. Many a reason have left me breathless in recent years, but some will not be discussed today for I am in a mood for celebration.
Yet I must tell you about my climb to the second floor of my local Whole Foods; an adventure that faintly resembled an ascent of Mount Kilimanjaro, perhaps because with my heart racing, I could hardly find my words once I stood facing the clerk who was ready to process my Amazon return. The night before, it had been a few spins on the dance floor that left me wishing for my good-ole-self. It seems, my body must be reminded of this strange thing others refer to as ‘physical activity’. It knows of the practice, but has not been encouraged to partake in quite a few years.
As it turns out, the body spends nine times more energy climbing stairs than sitting, and for the past six years, sitting has been my activity of choice. I sat at my kitchen table, facing a laptop for hours upon hours daily, toiling at my craft; standing only to provide sustenance for my family and myself. I’ve written in the kitchen, on the sofa, in bed, in airports, on the train, in the park, sitting, sitting, and more sitting. Those hours facing a screen or a page have been a delight and I’d be lying if I denied how thrilled I am with its yielding. Ninety thousand eight hundred and fifty-six words.
The manuscript I have spoken of is now complete and will soon be headed for copy editing. I write these words to make them known to you as much as to myself for I can hardly believe that the memoir I set to author is in fact about to exist; and this very fact truly leaves me breathless. Much still must be done before printed pages find their way to you, dear readers, but I trust it is now all but a matter of time. I am endlessly grateful to all of you who have supported my effort, with your advice, your encouragement, a like, a comment, a read. You have made that journey, that climb, ever more so enjoyable.
But for now, sit tight, this is only the beginning.
Born in the beginning of summer, I have always carried an affinity towards that time of year. Like every school age child, I looked forward to those sunny days spent home or away from home, with family. And when I grew older and was no longer a student, I continued to reap the benefits of the school year summer vacation, for I had been a teacher. Shortly thereafter, I became a mother and then again my year yielded to its seasonal interruption at the end of June, making room for sun and water, bonfires and fireworks.
Now that my daughters are adults, with professional lives of their own and no longer dependent on the school year calendar, summer is to me, only a redundant succession of sunny days; all quite the same as spring, save the higher temperature, and I cannot help but nurse a certain melancholy towards those years when we planned summer trips, booked airline tickets and cabins on cruise ships; rented small villas overlooking the sea or drove up north to a country house where the kids built life long relationships with the neighbors.
I miss the energy of our home when it beat to the rhythm of the seasons; when we fetched the ice skates from the back of the closet, and picnic blankets weeks later. When life breathed in every room and music played through the PA system as if we harbored a camp. I long for the faces of my daughters around the kitchen table, each sharing their day when we sat to dinner and perhaps if I could time travel I would take it all again; homework, morning rush and all. I’d go back to that youth; theirs and mine, and embrace summer the way it used to shelter us from the monotony of the rest of the year.
Congrats on finishing the manuscript!!!
I truly love it!! So well written! Perfectly expressed the feeling that sound way to familiar