Looking back at the past month, my days have been stretched between southern Virginia, middle Virginia, Greater New York, British Columbia, and a dinner somewhere in there in Seattle. I’ll be back in New York next week, then off to Charlottesville after that; possibly on a jury in mid-November, then back home for a west-coast style Thanksgiving.
Good grief.
I love the adventure of the “now” season of me. The travels and the new discoveries; the first times and grand introductions. It’s a whirlwind, and it’s intoxicating.
At the same time, though, a part of me is really looking forward to settling down. I’ve always kind of delighted in the idea of a slower routine, a life of being first a wife (not a lawyer), a mate (not merely a cocktail friend). A life of comfortable chores and errands and dates to the grocery store.
Don’t get me wrong, there will always be excitement in my life—I’m not looking to go all down-home and boring or anything, no siree. I think maybe I’m just finally seeing the bridge to that grown-up life I always imagined, off there in the distance, and I’m seriously considering crossing it.
About this time last week, mid-day on a Thursday, found me in a teeny tiny Laundromat on a quaint little main street somewhere north of New York City. A little old man jumped up to help me with the (okay, kind of intimidating) grey beasts, while housewives and household help taunted and teased Jerry Springer’s guests in the background. It was one of those perfect early fall days: a little bit drizzly, and cool enough for a scarf. Quiet as you cross the wet pavement, the sidewalks dotted with those little yellow leaves—the leaves that so boldly stick to your shoes, your windshield, your doormat, each doing its part to liven up the landscape. Little signs of coming change.
I’d never been to a Laundromat before (oh wonders of always living with facilities on-site!), so it excited me, perhaps, more than most. Seriously, though, I just loved it. Such a new thing! So outrageous! Laundromats had always been TV things for me; something you’d see on Friends or similar. Parts and pieces of that ethereal make-believe world that everyone knows isn’t really real life, but seems just entirely romantic just the same.
My fellow launders, however, were quite real, and quite charming. I really jumbled what I presume was a regular gathering—none of them hid their curiosity about me and my presence—but they made no mistake that they wanted to include me in their circle. Little old ladies, woman folding sheets, elderly gentleman flirting softly with all of them … then me, in my cutie little shoes and tied up mad hair, crashing through the door with the PhD’s over-stuffed basket of young-person laundry. Invasion! And yet, somehow, I fit.
They all eventually left—kudos to them for getting an early start, but I’ll sleep in, thanks—and then it was just me, the fluorescent lights, and the distant whir and hum as things got clean.
It was then that I realized, I liked that life. I could do that life. Start to finish, chaos to folded perfection, there was something calming there. A natural progression. Things come in and things go out; strangers come and old hats leave.
There’s a rhythm to everything, I’m learning. I’ve just got to find my next beat.