Feb. 2.

This is cool; I think I had this day last year.

And I'm in the same place.  Almost exactly.

Not entirely, of course.  I'm a whole year grown!  And.  I'm in New York City post-Hadar reunion--as I was last year, about to attend a Super Bowl party--as I was last year--with my ex--as he was last year.  We're still navigating, it seems.  We don't have the best sense of direction.  And I'm okay with this; I'm trying to do this thing where I choose shit intentionally and then be responsible about it.  So here I am, choosing this.

But there are new things too, because a year will do that to you.  I've accomplished a lot, I've fallen even more in love with Berkeley and almost everything and everyone in it, gluten allergies included.  I've landed a job, made new friends, learned new songs, felt new feelings (those!!).  I'm greeting February with cautious optimism, with tenderness, with a little self-protection, and with an understanding that sometimes, the same place keeps welcoming you because that's the place you deeply, desperately want to call home, and that it can be okay to lean into that place.  Do it with gevurah (discipline, strength), and you might just create something.

I'd also like to note that my iPhone corrects "gevurah" to "February," and alternatively, "hell yeah."  So.

As for these opening moments of February here in New York City, navigating these tried, well-traveled waters with some semblance of new wisdom for an old and indefatigable love, here's a favorite manifesto from the inestimable Mary Oliver.

A Pretty Song

From the complications of loving you
I think there is no end or return.
No answer, no coming out of it.

Which is the only way to love, isn't it?
This isn't a playground, this is
earth, our heaven, for a while.

Therefore I have given precedence
to all my sudden, sullen, dark moods
that hold you in the center of my world.

And I say to my body: grow thinner still.
And I say to my fingers, type me a pretty song,
And I say to my heart: rave on.

-- Mary Oliver