Where it started

I need something to think about besides the onslaught of 24/7 news cycle

The sea is high and restless under sunny skies. There’s a beach hazard warning for sneaker waves, and it’s easy to see why. The sea is blue, the clouds thin and far away, cirrus. Or maybe cirrostratus. I’ve been learning the names of things, and clouds are on the list.  

This morning, I walked into my studio and felt such a surge of joy that I had to say aloud, “thank you, my beautiful studio!” even though I actually am the one who created it, who saw it in a photo and instantly knew it would be My Place.  For a moment this morning, I stood and reveled in it—my things arranged around the room, a painting in progress (a seascape, naturally), my piles of notes for the book for next year, tentatively titled Memories of The Lost, and on which I’m working on finishing, things from my travels, all the art supplies, the beautiful view. I tend to dream of happiness in some future place, as when I saw this room the first time in a photo, and surged with my entire being toward it, then try to downplay it when it arrives in person. 

But why? Maybe I’m trying to appease the gods in some way my Irish grandmother would have wanted, never claiming aloud any good thing for fear it would be taken away. But as much as I adored her, that attitude didn’t seem to net much happiness. I’m working on being present for all of it. 

That’s what I was noticing this morning. This room is everything I could want for my making. I love the views and I admire the waves and the sky and the plants and the reflections a hundred times a day, looking up for a second, going back to the page, whether a drawing or a book or an essay. Inside the window, in the corner where they don’t interfere with the view, are some plants. Orchids, blooming prolifically after the move, a Boston fern because it appears I’m not happy without one, a succulent collection I found somewhere. My feet are warmed by my tuxedo cat Rafe, curled up on the pillow I rest my feet on, where heat blows from the vent. 

The sense of well-being is vast and deep. From here, I will go to work and grapple with the small architectural details of a nearly finished manuscript—searching out whatever repetitive words have crept in, sometimes in the same paragraph or even sentence, aligning facts that have been murky till now—is his name Ben or Brian? Which sister is older?—and probably my favorite part, smooth the sentences so that they each work on their own, but in a good cadence with the others. It’s akin to adding eyelashes to a portrait, or maybe the lines that create hair from a field of color. Fiddly and satisfying. 

Just right.