Napping creatures

In the long rays of afternoon light on the last day of the year I read through words from the months past and stare out the window. On the sofa Mr. Squish sleeps with his face tucked against the blue cushions that were a gift to ourselves this past April, when we were in sore need of a space to lie down. Since then it has hosted friends from New York, from Denver, from San Diego, Detroit, and Portland. In 2015 hopefully many more will visit and find it welcoming. Today it is my home, at least until nap time.

In 2014 we mastered a new skill: napping. Whether from injury, exhaustion, jetlag, or illness, we were often forced to sleep when able rather than when dark, to rest when the day became quiet, even at 3 pm. And so we did, all three of us, with great frequency. Mr. Squish is pleased with this turn, as he misses my ritual of Thursdays at home from the two years previous, when I would avoid the commute to Petaluma and instead pace our bedroom on long phone calls as he slept on the bed in the slim beams of sun those east-facing windows provided. In those afternoons he would nap on the bay window seats above the floorboard heater as I sat nearby at the desk. In 2014 he has the luxury of our new sofa and an expanse of north and west facing windows perfect for a sun-loving cat. He is not alone in this love, and often times has to share the couch. It’s an arangement that suits everyone.

In these last short days of winter we have managed to wring from 2014 more of the smiles we had hoped for at the year’s start. A few days on the North California coast gave us sun and the sounds of the ocean. A few days in the mountains of Colorado gave us the peace of being snowed in beneath thousands of stars. And now, at the end of the year, we have some time at home to curl up and reflect, to make art and to sing. Buried in the joy of these early afternoons and short evenings is a lesson about hopes and expectations and the challenges that will fill the rest of our lives.

The year started with a new job, with a new house, and plans for a wedding. It ended with five weddings, four bachelor/bachelorette parties, a huge number of new destinations, new trips, and new experiences. Also the worst injury of each of our lives, the longest break from ultimate, and the most hours of work we’ve ever clocked. 2014 was grueling, swallowing us with the feeling that we could do nothing but grind, do nothing but heal, and do nothing but celebrate.

In between these moments it has been a year of naps. A skill once learned on Tokyo trains and long haul flights has been perfected in hospital chairs, airport lounges, and on this exact sofa.

So, after both lunch and work emails are finished, Mr. Squish and I retire to the bed. The house is finally warm, and the sun streams in the windows. Later we will rise, welcome Tara home, and prepare to celebrate with friends. For now we curl up tight together with a furry blanket and surrender again to sleep.

Living in public

A long time ago I snuck out of bed late at night, awoken by a man hammering on his toilet. Climbing the stairs, my bare feet soon covered with concrete dust, I found him excavating in the new hours of the morning. Hidden in shadows and unmoving, he did not see me. After he returned inside, toilet firmly shoved against the wall, I crept back down and returned to bed. The image of that old man’s back strained in a curve beneath the thin undershirt he wore as he tugged the toilet from his apartment in the dead of night has never left me.

Living in cities we are close to each other. In Tokyo men pushed us on to trains and we riders willingly subjected ourselves to a closeness no American city, no Chinese railway, really knows. The last Saikyo line out of Shinjuku on a Saturday night remains the closest I have ever been to several hundred other people. Mosh pits of my earlier years share so little with the orderly sacrifice of intoxicated and exhausted city dwellers desperate for a lift to the suburbs.

Bouncing home on the 38 down Geary last week the bus smelled mostly of pee. Sometimes we are too close to one another. Leaving the theater two men are arguing over a woman who is wisely nowhere in sight. They attempt physical harm but are well past the point in the evening of injuring anyone save themselves. They may be well past the point in their lives.

We live densely, the ratio of person to thing higher than it perhaps ought to be. This is the miracle of cities, what makes them such fountains of energy when the weather is good. There are so many people in Shanghai that if everyone set off fireworks on one day the city would be ablaze with light, louder than TV war zones and more covered with smoke. On Chinese New Year we did, and the burning banging popping craze overwhelmed the landscape for three days. Standing in the middle of the street watching red paper flutter down in smoke so dense it obscured the skyscrapers surrounding me I reveled in it. This, I thought, is why we are here, living so close together, enduring each other’s company. So that when the time comes to celebrate, we are never alone.

In the Richmond our apartment faces the street. After years of quiet in Colorado and the Sunset we are surprised to again be part of the city. The police sirens doppler past us, waves washing over our music. At two drunks wandering home from the bar curse loudly outside our windows at people we do not know. At mid day the robotic announcements of the outbound 38 bus trickle in, a reminder of the paths outside these walls. A boy skateboards past, his hard wheels sending each break of pavement up to our ears, a morse code of our new block’s sidewalks. Hearing his success I wear my Heelys to the new coffee shop.

We are, then, back. Members of a tribe found packed together in boxes of wood and concrete, able to share each other’s lives, for better or worse, each morning and much of each night.