One thing about being home much of the time is that I feel more in tune with the rhythm of the days than I ever was in the closed cave of the library. Therefore, more noticeable of their changes. Each day I sit at my work space, which is a different spot from my writing desk, which gets less used now that writing usually happens here, where my bigger laptop and regular keyboard set up is necessary for layouts and freelance work that has me typing more than I used to. . A decade or more ago, I used to sit at the opposite end, when I didn't have a desk in the living room, but here, with my back to the dining room/studio windows, I feel far more connected with outside.and its the rumble of trucks in the alley. With the tiny courtyard that runs between my building and a set of townhomes. The rhythms of those people and the delivery men coming and going. Since I don't have an A/C, there were days in the summer when I could feel the heat encroaching at my back. Could feel and smell the rain blowing in when it stormed. Today, the shivery cold that finally made me shut them.
The light is different now all the time. And less of it. While in summer I could work until eight, almost nine without turning on lamp, now, it's necessary before 7. Tonight, I took some packages to drop in the blue box at the end of the street tonight and it was one of those cool fall nights where I needed a sweater. Dark, but early enough that there were still a lot of people out moving to and fro. It always surprises me, the bustle of early evening, since I saw so little of it before. Normally I would be downtown and only coming home after 11 or so. Now, by 11, I am usually winding down after making dinner and getting ready to settle in to watch something or other.
Summer felt longer but faster, if that's possible. I felt more of it, even if I only went out in it occasionally. But there was at the same time more variation in its texture, much less time spent under fluorescent lights amid book stacks and more time for noticing things, even just from a third floor window. Listening, as well, to unruly car alarms, distant sirens, how sometimes I can hear the train two blocks away clearly, but sometimes not at all. Every Monday, the lawn mower down below me and the scent of just cut grass. The steady bang of renovations in surrounding apartments. The creep and click of my remaining neighbor's doors.
I really didn't go out much. only occasional walks on milder days over to the water or around the block. A few trips to pick up prints downtown. A couple trips to Rockford and movie date nights. As someone who spent most of the lockdowns in 2020 and several holiday breaks behaving much the same, none of it is new. I revel in being a homebody. There have been a couple weeks where the farthest I went was the alley to take out trash, the lobby to collect packages, or the blue mailbox. I would occasionally long for pre-covid things like bars or more social outings, but they passed. I do want more movie outings, and maybe some thrifting, which doesn't quite have the same oomph done via ebay. We've hit a season where walks are less likely to be sunburnt and sweaty, so no doubt more enjoyable when taken.
I love fall and these changes, but, of course the backside of it is winter, which is much less enjoyable, particularly that swift descent into dark which feels like it will need even more of an adjustment...
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