It's been snowing a little every day, and when I look outside, I see stories being rewritten. Or maybe what I am seeing if forgetting. Over and over, paths soften and blur; the cuneiform prints of small creature feet disappear. Almost every trace of where we've been is gone. But because we have been in a cycle of freezes and thaws, and because we've only gotten an inch or two at a time, it's never quite a clean page. Under the fresh fall, crusted ice captures yesterday's footsteps, frozen into trip hazards, marked by gentle dimples.
I've felt low-key disoriented since the election, like I've somehow gotten lost in a familiar place. If I keep my focus very close—birds at the feeder, faces at the dinner table, pen on paper, the river freezing, snowflakes falling—I know where I am. But then, I read the news, and the nausea comes, because the bigger stories are splintering, and things that should be remembered are forgotten, covered over by the relentless more, more, more of the present.
Once, in a very different context, my friend Abbey wrote about her grief about losing the adults in the room—the calm voices and wise minds of earned authority, the trusted experts, there to offer a hand up to understanding. They are almost impossible to find now, lost in a blizzard of takes and anxious posturing and calls to subscribe and junk misinformation and vacuous AI content. It's a perpetual flurry.
But the real snow still falls, for now, at least. And each time it falls, I fall under its spell, enjoying the illusion that the old world can be made new. When I took the dog out the other night, the snow was coming down heavy, and even though the sky was dark, the air was white: there was a strange light, and because I could feel the flakes coming down, icy feathers brushing against my face, my awareness of my body in space was heightened. It was like being in water, that swirl of white darkness. And when we walked back to the door, the dog stopped, so I stopped, too. Through the scrim of snow, I could just see the smudged shadow-bodies of two deer, running through my neighbor's yard. I imagine they were looking for somewhere safe. The coyotes are out.
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Is the new year a clean page? Not really, I think, but it not a bad excuse for trying different things. I'm practicing French verbs, making Victorian puzzle purses, and reading massive Japanese crime novels.
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Knitbrary cardigan (past season; I am hoping one turns up in my size resale one day) / B Sides Lasso jeans in black (got a pair on super sale over the summer, and golly, I love them) / Kronos Quartet Performs Philip Glass (have been listening to P.G. nonstop this month; "Mishima / Closing" every day) / Ersa Dandin Mini Torso pearl earrings / Composition ledger notebook from Choosing Keeping (if I write in a notebook adorned with Renaissance angels will my words be heavenly?) / lucky gold pencil (I will take all the luck I can hold) / Jamie Haller oxblood Belgian loafers / Christina Iversen Shell cup (found at Bona Drag; no. 1 on my coveted-item list) / Valda mint pastilles (because January air is dry) / Daiyo rice bran candles (this post brought to you by my new painfully twee/self-indulgent practice of lighting a tiny candle and writing whatever comes to mind until it burns out.)
