i can’t think of a better subtitle: if it’s not one weird thing, it’s another.
in these ‘new’ days of gettin’-a-teeny-weeny-bit-older we’re thinkin’ we need a good measure of flexibility. or at least a good sense of humor. “goin’ with the flow” is kind of an understatement.
we wake up and check in with each other over coffee…did you sleep/are your ears ringing/how’s your neck/back/hip/knee/shoulder/pinky toe/do you feel achy/why do we keep waking up at 4??
dogga patiently listens at the end of the bed. he knows our list o’ woes will stop soon and we’ll joyfully have breakfast – which means he gets the treat of bites of potato. he’s familiar with our waking-up process and knows we actually do wake up happy most of the time and – so far – we are pretty good at fording the ever-raging river of … ummm … aging.
nevertheless, it does seem to be an increasingly weird list.
the color of a palomino, the pod of milkweed off the side of the trail captures my attention. though i want to touch it, to feel what looks like a velvety ear, i don’t disturb it. this pod has burst open, its seeds scattered, waiting for verdant spring and the eventual arrival of monarchs. the butterflies left the midwest for the winter, migrating, traveling up to 2500 miles to shelter and hibernate through winter in coolness that is not cold.
their diapause is a period of suspended development. it is common in the insect world, this inactivity: “a state in which their growth, development, and activities are suspended temporarily, with a metabolic rate that is high enough to keep them alive.” it’s a kind of dormancy. it sounds a little like isolating in the middle of a pandemic, a little like a response to a few more-difficult years. a slowing down, an insulating, a turning-in, heartbeats enough to sustain yet not enough for vast inspiration. hmm.
back on our favorite local trail, we are watching it wake. we take note of the changes in color, the changes in the woods, in the meadows. sipping coffee this morning we listen to the new sounds – birdcalls we have missed in the quietude of winter, the middle of our diapause.
we start to feel the pull of the outside more, the draw of places to see, the falling-off of quilts we have wrapped around us. i begin to wonder – with a little more energy – what next and next look like. the sun streams in the window and stays up later, pushing back night like feet on a crab soccer ball.
we begin to break open the pod of our diapause, long after milkweed but before the butterflies come back.
reverse threading 