Cold weather has snuck back in, interrupting a string of very nice spring days. I took a run this morning in Central Park, forgoing gloves and a hat in the hopes that the air would feel soft and warm like yesterday, and my fingers were numb by the time I finished. I sprinted the two blocks back from the park’s entrance and stopped, breathing hard, outside my apartment. I let that (incredibly good) post-run tiredness wash over me, and fumbled to try and untie my front door key from my shoelaces where I store it on runs.
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My brownstone is nestled up right next to another one; our buildings share a stoop and set of steps down to the street. When it’s nice enough out, one of my neighbors likes to sit on the top step and read his newspaper. He’s like the mayor of our little block, always waving to passersby. He even sometimes brings his cordless telephone out and takes a call. (I’ve always wondered who he is talking to.)
Every single time I happen to come home when he’s sitting outside, he looks up as if completely surprised to see me, and without fail he says: “Nice day, isn’t it?”
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Well, today has been a little blue. And rather than retreat into the blueness of it, I thought it might be comforting to be here and write to you, whoever and wherever you are. I thought why not spend a few brief moments talking about something bright? Maybe it will brighten your day. And in any event, the exercise of sitting to put pen to paper—so to speak—often feels just as cathartic as a brisk morning run or a hot shower at night.
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It’s a brighter day than yesterday—my mood is sunnier, but not light. Sometimes I’m struck by this particular sensation: Of being calm and content but having a gentle, insistent feeling of so many little anxieties hovering at the edges of your mind. They whisper quietly now and again, and aren’t loud enough that you can’t hush them, but they’re there.
Other days those shadows aren’t there; you’re unfettered in your happiness. Or you’re mired in a crisis—work stress or a fight with your sister or nerves over an impending trip—and that’s all you feel.
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Yesterday was one of those golden spring days. You know, one of the first really warm ones? Where you don’t have to wear a jacket, and it seems like everyone in the entire world is outside? The city feels like a spring-themed I Spy book—everywhere I turn I see things I’d missed all winter: frisbees whizzing through the air in Washington Square Park, a Mister Softee truck rounding the corner ahead of me on Chambers Street, guys jogging in shorts and t-shirts down the West Side Highway.
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