Adventures in (Slow) Moving
It's a season of chaos and contemplation - plus luscious things to read.
Slow Moving
I’m in the midst of moving, going from a house in an olive grove to one just off the plateia in a nearby mountain village. The photo shows the side of a moving box, the rooms ready to be checked off. So orderly. But that belies the messy reality. It’s a time of chaos and contemplation, a process raises questions both large and small:
Why do I save so many random scraps of paper?
What do I really care about?
What is worth keeping and what should go?
For this "adventure in moving," my husband and I have the luxury of time, so we are literally slow moving. It’s a chance to see the stuff of my life with new eyes. It’s a gift, really. A pain in the keister, sure. But also a gift.
As I work through the drawers and closets of this place we’ve called home for five years, I'm discovering archaeological evidence of the life I left behind in Portland, Oregon in 2019. Back then, I had a big corporate job, and still have a vestigial set of business clothes and – I kid you not – pantyhose. Not sure why I’ve kept them, to be honest. Here in Greece, I’m in a swim suit or a sweat suit depending on the season. Pretty simple.
I find myself wanting less and less stuff. Not that I’m embracing minimalism. God forbid. I’m a maximalist at heart, and the current austere aesthetic feels drab and dispiriting to me. Buy a color already!
But still. It’s clear that not everything I hold onto truly matters. Much of it is just baggage.
Old clothes, old expectations, old hopes. For sure old fears and resentments, they can go. Even old achievements. I’m not sure I need those anymore either, even though I chased them hard.
The most tantalizing item in the keep-donate-toss triage is a subtle beast, a lifelong companion, as familiar as the inside of my mind. Could I let go of my urgent attachment to things working out in a particular way? Imagine how much lighter my life could be. At 62, I don’t want to carry it anymore, and anyway, there’s isn’t enough room where I’m going. In my new home, there is only space for infinite love.
XO Jean
Welcome to the Season of Blooming
Each culture has its traditions for marking time and shuffling the deck of seasons. Nature offers her ceremonies, poets offer ours.
In Rivkah Lambert Adler’s poem “Cherries in June”, a tree reteaches us our loveliness. Fresh and reverent, we witness the wonder of emergence.
With a deep bow to all that is blooming in you,
Sage Cohen, Poetry Editor
For you fiction fans: Priceless
Meet Dolores Hannigan – Dinkie to her husband. Her life is about to get a technicolor glow up, in this wry, funny and sharply observed short story by Lilah Wild. Here's a little taste...
"Sunny California. It was a little daytime mantra, Sunny California, where life was saturdated with color. The commercials flashed vision after vision: green vegetable gardens, a poofy sky-blue couch, petite pink bars of soap, a glass of orange juice like freshly-poured paradise."
Illuminating the Mundane
Lunch with your mom in a diner. What could be more everyday? Yet this red vinyl upholstery and the oval white plates loaded with salad become a poetic realm through the right eyes.
For Amy Losak, those eyes were her mother's, and learning to see through them showed her life's delicious details, hiding in plain sight.
And Now for Something Completely Funny
An older man and a younger woman is ho hum normal. But an older woman and a younger man still raises an eyebrow. Leave it to our intrepid Susannah Bianchi to give us the (hilarious) lowdown on the whole cougar thing. Plus: Pizza is involved!
