Return of the Native

I am so pumped to be back in New York state, after 7 years in Florida and 1 1/2 in California (reverse order). People must be getting sick of hearing me say it, but I can't help it. I'm dancy with joy. Ebullient is the perfect word. And surely it must be nice to hear me sing praises after so many years of unhappiness.

I've had my first winter and spring back; now comes my first summer (I am, after all, taking them in order). In Florida, my evenings were often just spent waiting for it to be time to go to bed. Depressing, yes. Now, I'm all sad when it's 10 p.m. and I have to wind things down so I can get enough sleep to be awake all day tomorrow. The light is so cool, and the sun is up much earlier and later than Down South. I totally flash back to my college summers, when I would be up till 3 or 4 easily, writing and reading and dancing to Guns 'n' Roses videos. I knew every sweet Axl move.

Those were magical nights (days too), full of daydreams and stories and wishes for the future. Granted, they were also very alone days and nights, and given the choice, I would add some real people into the mix. But there's nothing I can do about my 20-year-old self now. What I can do is read through my journals from those days and be hugely impressed by my writing then. I had so much inspiration going on somehow, sitting in the back yard out by the pond or by my open window with the night air breathing gently in on me.

One of my planned projects for this summer is to post a lot of that here. I only just realized the confluence of these times as I wrote that sentence. This time around, at least, I will be living outside my spinning mind as much as in it. If I have anything to say about it.