I've been feeling pretty quiet lately, so I took it slow for most of the break. Plans to travel never really came together, but I'm not too broken up about it. The first month and change here were pretty whirlwind, getting my bearings and meeting new people and learning my way around, and I think it was good to step back for a little while and take some space to breathe.

It's getting to be the time that we've been warned about, when it's all not quite as shiny and new as when we arrived, but when things still don't come naturally and you can start to get worn down. I'm keeping an eye out, with my history of tanking when the sun gets short, but this year I think things are going to be okay.

Today when I was walking near Bellecour I bought a paper cone of roasted chestnuts from a man with a cart. I've never had them before, but the smell of them caught me as I walked by, and they were exactly right - smooth and nutty and smoky and warm in my cold hands.


Hannah came over and we drank wine out on the balcony to celebrate the anniversary of last year's election. Thinking about that time is strange for me. I miss virtually nothing about it, and I have clear memories of what a misery it was. I also remember not feeling, all that often, like anything I was doing mattered at all. But it's been my experience that intensity on that level always leaves me with a nostalgia for those moments of joy that are so much more vivid for being stolen and rare.

On the whole I much prefer things as they are now, when joy is something I can look for almost every day. But this day last year there was delight and tears and there were fireworks, even in Alaska, and it was beginnings and endings and waiting and getting ready to move.

It's strange it's already been a year, I guess is what I'm trying to say, and it's strange it hasn't been three. And I still don't know what's next.