camaraderie

The new space is bright and long. The instructor was a thin, tan, beautiful woman with a British accent. I wanted to laugh out loud at how easy her social life must be. I hated every moment of our flow. I was struggling, I was suffering -- but at the same time I knew it was hitting every muscle group I'd been trying to target. My chest and hips opened up almost against their will. I left feeling released. I took a nap.

I met an old friend for a drink. I took two trains to the end of Astoria and was reminded that I don't even need to leave the city for a new perspective -- that leaving my own neighborhood reminds me of how much a cocktail should cost and how common botox is (isn't), really. I do love my neighborhood, truly -- love the lights of the waterfront at every time of day, love my local gym and my local coffee shops and my local yoga studios and the walk to the L. I'll be so so sad when I'm priced out.

Yesterday, I took out my headphones and set down my phone and simply gazed. It was a picture book version of a bustling city park. Near me, a man was reading a book out loud to his girlfriend. Two little league games were underway. A group of men tossed around a rugby ball and made genuinely charming conversation. A man jogged by with his excited dog running alongside. A circle of families surrounded a puppet show.

I've been feeling ungenerous lately, annoyed. I recognize it, it comes from being scared and insecure. Like a Dickens character, turning small and mean and cramped from trying to hold onto something. I've seen it in other people, and I don't like to see it in myself. I've always felt so lucky, it's made me so happy.

The last time I was in Portland, my aunt told me she'd been thinking and writing a lot about the word 'happy' in its traditional meaning. Like in Jane Austen. "Happy" meant fortunate. "Happy circumstances." "A happy choice." Lucky. I turned to her in some amazement, out on our walk through the streets of Northeast Portland under the cherry trees.

So hearing that my coworkers weren't upset with me, had not been silently cataloguing my mistakes or rooting against my success, as the tiny wretched terrified little gremlin inside me sometimes whispers, flooded me with affection and gratitude. Made me want to reciprocate with generous interpretations and assumptions of good faith. I have always been so lucky. To be born bright and smart. To meet with people even smarter than me. To find people so funny and curious and generous, so sharp and confident. In life and in work, to be recognized and valued. Despite all my mistakes and all my small mean gremlins.