Alexandersmap

    Category: seasons

    • This Little Spark

      “You’ve got to be crazy. It’s too late to be sane. Too late. You’ve got to go full-tilt bozo. ‘Cause you’re only given a little spark of madness, and if you lose that, you’re nothing. Note, from me to you. Don’t ever lose that cause it keeps you alive” — Robin Williams, Come Inside My Mind

      What keeps us alive is more than air and water and food. What keeps us alive is adventure and mischief, discovery and creative output, deep thoughts and thrilling moments. Aliveness is captured energy in the moment before it moves on to the next vehicle. We’re all just batteries holding on to energy for some amount of time before we concede it to the next generation. We ought to use that little spark for exhilaration in our time.

      Batteries are drawn down in time, but they can also be recharged. I’m plunging into cold water again. Two days in a row, and for as many as I can string together until the water warms up enough that it’s no longer a cold water plunge. And my goodness, how I’ve missed the adrenaline high though all of this orange-tinted darkness of the world. To hell with the darkness. We must do the things that bring us energy, and hold the line for light and being.

      As Robin Williams once reminded us in a memorable character, carpe diem! Seize the day! We only have this one go at things. So go! We can all do our own version of full-tilt bozo, making memorable in this gift of a life. What’s the alternative? We’ll rest soon enough.

    • Practicing Lagom: Moderation and Balance

      “Lagom (pronounced [ˈlɑ̂ːɡɔm], LAW-gom) is a Swedish word meaning ‘just the right amount’ or ‘not too much, not too little’.
      The word can be variously translated as ‘in moderation’, ‘in balance’, ‘perfect-simple’, ‘just enough’, ‘ideal’ and ‘suitable’ (in matter of amounts).” — via Wikipedia

      I try (sometimes successfully) to live by the maxim, “all things in moderation”. So when I came across this Swedish word, lagom, that means roughly the same thing while awaiting a large latte at a cafe last week, I had to look into it more. I’m guessing that cafe has seen its share of over-caffeinated zombies shuffling in. A little art to remind us to chill was appropriate. When the student is ready the teacher will appear.

      Life is simple when we allow it to be. We ought to practice a routine of self-regulation, which also serves as an act of self-preservation. Like anything we hoard or overindulge in, it can overwhelm us if we let it. We can’t have it all, so why try to grab it all? It will drag us down and drown us if we don’t let go of the non-essential. What is essential? It’s really not all that much when we really think about it.

      My bride spent hours on a slushy Saturday cleaning up the attic, bagging used clothing to donate, throwing away things that couldn’t be donated but were no longer of use and generally getting things sorted for the new season. It was a good way to spend a wet and raw day. We accumulate things, and if we’re not careful those things end up ruling our lives.

      In that spirit of spring cleaning, springtime is also a good time to clean up some habits we’ve accumulated along the way. Perhaps we eat more than we should, or indulge in a bit too much wine or coffee or social media outrage. Perhaps we’ve grown lazy with a habit or two we thought would make all the difference in those heady days leading up to New Years Eve. Why not use this time to clean out the old and introduce something new?

      If life seems pretty tense at the moment, it may be a sign that we need to find a way to self-regulate. Stop over-indulging in the non-essential. Spring is a great time to reset and embrace the things that make us healthier, happier and more resilient against the stressors that are out of our control. What is “just enough” for us? Consume less, carry less, and lighten the load we bear. Stay in that lane awhile and we may find we have more spring in our step.

    • Basking In It

      “Time is not slipping through our fingers, time is here forever, it is we who are slipping through the fingers of time.” — David Whyte, Time

      I was texting with a friend who is struggling to balance work with a toddler. She’s prioritizing appropriately, and to use her words, basking in it every day. And shouldn’t she? The diapers and sleepless nights will soon slide into recitals and homework, which will slip into college tours and wedding announcements.

      Tempus fugit: time flies. But when we turn that around and look at it as Whyte has shown us, we realize it’s been us all along, slipping into infinity. This can be depressing or beautiful, depending on how we choose to spend that time. So bask away, friend. Let those grains of sand tickle a little as they flow past in such a hurry.

    • Ripe For Something

      “I feel ripe for something, yet do nothing, can’t discover what that thing is. I feel fertile merely. It is seedtime with me. I have lain fallow long enough.” — Henry David Thoreau, The Journal of Henry David Thoreau

      If January brings with it resolution to change, February brings bitter reality. Some winters are more bitter and persistent than others. This winter is overachieving on the bitterness scale.

      The pup runs out with her tail wagging, charging past the cleared path and packed snow into the deeper stuff, breaks through the frozen crust and her legs plunge into the deep. One paw trudging after the other, breaking crust and plummeting. All joy is halted and she looks back at me in despair.

      “What is this?!”

      “That’s bitter reality”, I whisper back to her, coaxing her out of the worst of it.

      That’s February 2025.

      Still, the days grow brighter. Thoughts of March are stirring, with April is right behind it. April is daffodils and fragrance. The only fragrance in February is gasoline and windshield fluid. We can look at the lengthening days and think of daffodils, even if they feel a long way off. We can work to survive the worst of winter in the hope of getting to the best of spring.

      Things are darkest before the dawn, and these are the days when we feel something stir within. Thoreau’s journal entry rings true: We can feel it but we aren’t really sure what it is yet. Something is awakening within us, something profoundly ours. It’s our why, our purpose, and it is born and expressed in the things we do with it from here. Unlocked from the inertia of our darkest days into something brighter. Keep trudging pup, joyful days are stirring.

    • Virgin Snow

      “Every single thing you do today is something that your 90-year-old self will wish they could go back and do.
      The good old days are happening right now.”
      — Sahil Bloom

      Overnight snow is the best kind of snow. It’s like Christmas morning with its big reveal at first light. With it, we may think in terms of chores or play. Either way, it won’t be here forever. We must always remember that neither will we.

      Snow removal completed on the home front, sun offering a brilliant day that felt warmer than it really was, I read the timely Thread above from Sahil Bloom and it reinforced what I knew I had to do. Really, I’d been thinking it all morning. Get out there in it! Find some virgin snow and glide across it with all the vigor one can muster. For we may never cross this way again.

      Snowshoeing on local trails can be thrilling or discouraging, depending on the condition of the trail and the snowshoer. It didn’t start off well, with a dog walker arriving just ahead of me post-holing the trail where the snowshoers before me had been. Adding insult to injury, the dog walker didn’t clean up her dog’s poop, dropped right next to the trail. That’s no way to go through life, I thought to myself. But walkers in deep snow are quickly overtaken; I nodded hello, said hi to the pup and kept my feelings to myself. I was here for something more essential than policing other people’s behavior. I was here to fly.

      The main trail had already seen visitors, and I did my part to compress the trail further—a gift for those who would follow without snowshoes. Eventually I reached an intersection where the snowshoer before me had gone left, while the side trail to the right was virgin snow extending on through the trees for as far as my eyes could see. The choice was clear.

      Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
      I took the one less traveled by,
      And that has made all the difference.
      — Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken

      I know these woods well. I know where the waterfalls lie smothered under ice and snow, where granite outcroppings and hemlocks form a cathedral as beautiful as anything made by man. Snow transforms the landscape and forces one to learn it anew. If the trail had been broken I might have strayed further afield, but I felt an obligation to guide those who would follow my tracks. Stay on trail to show the way, and I may stray another day.

      I tend to think in time buckets now. What might I do now that I won’t be able to do later in life, when I’m old and frail? Do that thing now and celebrate the gift of health and vigor. Maybe one day we will regret not watching others live their best lives while we sat on the sidelines, but I think not. This is our time too. What are we to do but make the most of this day?

      Virgin snow with a worn, familiar trail revealed underneath
      Out and back trail compression

    • Seasonal Shifts

      “If we winter this one out, we can summer anywhere,” — Seamus Heaney

      “On the other side of endurance, joy waits.” — Joanna Nylund, Sisu: The Finnish Art of Courage

      I have friends currently afloat in pristine, turquoise waters. I have other friends unsatisfied with the snowpack in their own backyards who hike seemingly every waking moment above tree line to find paradise in fickle and extreme weather conditions. I could be doing either of those things myself right now, but instead I’m holding the center that we may all meet in the middle again one day.

      We do have agency with such things as winter. We may choose to stoke the fire and watch the storms pass by from the comfort of our favorite chair, book in hand and a hot beverage to warm us from the inside out. Or we can dress the part and venture out into the swirling snows and bitter wind, to taste for ourselves the bite of January. If we have the currency of health and the accessories of winter, there’s every reason to fully experience everything winter has to offer.

      The world feels colder and darker than it’s felt in some time. These shifts are seasonal, we tell ourselves. The pendulum will swing back one day to warmer and brighter. Our mission is to toe the line between chaos and order and make the most of our days, whatever the climate. This is stoicism. This is grit. This is Sisu. Whatever we wish to call it, it’s a mindset and quiet resolve to face the day and whatever it brings to us. To hold the line and winter out the worst that we may summer it up again one day.

    • A Fragile Walk

      On and on the rain will say
      How fragile we are how fragile we are
      — Sting, Fragile

      A woman in town walked out on the pond ice to take a picture of the moon and broke through the thin ice. She fought to get out of the frigid water, and when that failed, to hold on for help. After several minutes of struggle a rescuer had a hold of her and it felt like she would survive. But the ice broke on the rescuer and in his plunge he lost grip on the woman. Exhausted and hyperthermic she slipped under the water to her death. The rescuer, distraught and frozen, was himself rescued. I wondered what her plans were for the Saturday evening she wouldn’t live to see.

      It’s thankfully rare for someone to drown in this pond. A friend with a long memory can only recall two other incidents in the last hundred years. He had walked on the ice himself not far from where she broke through, but knew the ice better. She had simply strayed too far from the safety of thicker ice as dusk turned to dark to see the moon. Were it an hour earlier perhaps more people in the area could have made a difference.

      We all tread on fragile ground. Memento mori. Our duty is to recognize this and optimize the time we have left. Don’t fear dying, fear not living while we may.

    • Light the Signal Fire

      “Life is too short to be little. Man is never so manly as when he feels deeply, acts boldly, and expresses himself with frankness and with fervor.” — Benjamin Disraeli

      There were days this year that felt pretty small. Those days working from home with a few scheduled Teams meetings were pretty ordinary. Some days the farthest I ventured was the top of the street walking the dog. Let me assure you that this is not a criticism of being home, but of balance. Everything has its time. We can retreat to the comfort of our homes when we are older, more frail and less inclined towards adventure. One day too soon we will lack the stamina for vigorous living. While we are healthy and vibrant we owe it to ourselves to be bolder.

      Now don’t get me wrong, the past year had a healthy dose of adventure. I’m grateful for the places we’ve gone, the projects we’ve completed and the long string of bucket list experiences that made 2024 one for the ages. Truly, many of those experience will be once in our lifetime. We can savor who we’ve become while still aiming for more.

      The thing is, we get a taste for living a larger life, and those days we settle in to the every day routine can feel, well, routine. We must spend the currency we have in its season, be it health, wealth or time, because some things cannot be saved for a later date. We must know when we’ve chopped enough wood. There comes a time when we need to stop chopping and light that fire already! To allow it to burn brighter, as a signal fire to the world that we are here, and to warm ourselves in the glow of memories in our less vigorous days to come.

    • Happy Holidays

      “All you can take with you is that which you’ve given away.”
      — Pa Bailey, It’s a Wonderful Life

      We had the clan together at the same table for the first time in forever last night. It was a wonderful way to celebrate Christmas Eve, breaking bread and catching up face-to-face. All adults now. We’re spread across the country, this clan, and it’s a joy to be under the same roof again, if only for a day. And that’s the whole point of this holiday season; our gift of time together.

      For those who celebrate, Merry Christmas. And Happy Holidays to all who don’t. May these days bring peace and love to your doorstep.

    • Stepping Into Change

      So let this winter
      of listening
      be enough
      for the new life
      I must call my own.
      — David Whyte, The Winter of Listening

      I met a friend for a pint yesterday. It turned into a small pub crawl between two breweries as the crisp air filled with swirling snow. We talked of the familiar and the forever changing as the snow accumulated and the town roads clogged with drivers uncertain about what to do when the world turns white again. With a nod to the familiar we needed to return to, we cut our reunion short and joined the other drivers while our heads were still clear enough to join the fray.

      Snowflakes melt on the back of my neck as I moved the brush around the truck, feeling my footing on snowy concrete with the anticipation of slippery roads. Like any skill that’s been dormant for some time, walking and driving on icy roads is muscle memory. It all comes back quickly, we just need to take it slowly while the rust clears. We’ve been together before, the winter whispers reassuringly, and sure enough one tentative step brings us to the next and soon we’re safely home again.

      December often hints at changes to come in our lives. Mine is no exception; change has whispered in my ear for months. When the world starts swirling with the forever changing, we may carry the reassurance of having been here before. The landscape may change in disorienting ways, but we’ve developed the skills to navigate this new world safely on our journey of becoming. Keep a clear head and listen for what whispers. Stepping into change is nothing new for us.