The morning sky was a lovely peach with streams of ivory against a page of baby blue when I first opened my eyes. When I open them again, the frills were erased leaving a mere trace of pink dust. A sense of urgency comes over me.
Through the last grey days of February my focus waned. This, after a robust start of the year. I wouldn’t trade the challenges and thrills of being an entrepreneur for anything, but the rise and fall of success is dictated solely by my own choices. My task list has grown horns. My day planner is a squint-eyed dictator. My dream list is calling. I need time to connect with friends, and to read poetry, or anything fun. Sunshine is a must.
I glance at the thermometer outside and groan a little. I don’t feel like taking advantage of the bright 45 degrees outside. Friends in other parts of the country text and tweet about pretty blooms beginning to appear, but in Montana we have weeks of snow still to come. My body clock and the weather are at odds. I’m restless. Distracted. A little self-pity is justified, isn’t it? Maybe, I’ll just curl up with a book and escape.
Ugh, I can’t. I’m having that crazy, anxious, buzzing throughout my body—the one that stems from deep within a woman’s body in the springtime; a shoot breaking forth, pushing up through the dark—the need to create. It’s March and innately our DNA says it’s time to stretch, tidy up the nest, and venture out.
My husband and I are struggling to be on the same page at this time of year. I have big dreams; and he, a schoolteacher of elementary children… wears a harried look. Sis is talking about Peru, maybe Machu Picchu, or Brazilian beaches, Rio? Yes, daughter, I will dream that with you too, and add it to my list of wishes.
For now, though, I want to hunker down, attend to the earth, and birth something. I want dirt under my nails. I need to bake a cake, hold a baby, or grow a garden, a plant…anything rather than fighting these technology issues and being harassed by online marketers selling, selling, selling. I close the office door.
I’m already wearing yoga pants, so I wriggle my right foot into a running shoe, then into the left when my mind’s not looking. Bending down to tie the laces, I decide to do a hamstring stretch while my head is down near the floor. I drop and do some other stretches and sit ups. Groan. I can call that good. Instead, I take a long swig of water, and pull on a purple running hoodie that makes me too hot to stay indoors; another trick that gets me closer to that run my soul wants. My body resists at the beginning, but this is the call from inertia and indecision. It’s not too difficult now to reach for a beanie and my phone. I’ve got this.
The air is cold. My thighs burn at first. My chest and neck are tight. I focus on my core instead of the incline through a still-slumbering forest and aged banks of snow. Muscles loosen and my pace settles into the cadence of breath and footfalls.
Thirty minutes pass. I crest a hill and slow the rapid inhale/exhale to listen to the evergreens sing their pulsing melody so like the sound of ocean waves. To the south, mountains rise up, snow is glowing on the Spanish Peaks as if the light emanates from within—crisp white peaks against their shadows in the sky.
Nature knows her rhythm, and I do too, if I’ll just listen and get in stride. The snow will melt, the rivers will flood their mossy green banks, and Spring will be birthed again.