WEATHERING THE DAY

A More Natural Environment

The anticipation of the days warming to 60 degrees by Monday is delightful. My relationship with weather is a matrilineal genetic disposition coming to the fore. Yet still, I appreciate a gray day often for its warmth, its subdued light, its moodiness that brings a painterly feel to an everyday scene. Having lived under a western sky, renowned for its relentless blue, also increases an appreciation for any kind of cloud cover. Out there, dry rain is the term for the storm clouds passing over to drop elsewhere.

We move through air we take for granted, a more natural environment than the pool water I have return to after a year away from swimming. The altered gravity, the playful resistance of water, is felt more keenly than the way our bodies alter the air current or stir the floating dust. Until now, I have never swum before dawn or seen the light overtake dawn through high steamed windows.

I’ve worked from home so long I never though I would find it stultifying, yet that balance with activities outside the home has always been critical. Is it simply that I need to get up and out of the house in the morning? To be so active so early in the day runs against my history. This is change. My mood lifts, now to solidify my resolve.

A cerebral relationship with the natural world has long been my interest, but I have not pursued it until these years of traveling back and forth to live in or near vast public lands out west. My roots in the east persist and the idea I once relished that we might live out west year round horrifies me—chiefly because of giving up community. The psychic importance of DC’s cultural offerings, its diversity, sophistication and liberal leanings became more apparent from the perspective of red state living. And forget amenities like nearby rec centers with pools.

Essay by Rosie Dempsey