February 1

I have this memory of February. I am 12 and at a friend’s house. She has a pool and we are in one-piece bathing suits standing with our toes over the edge of the deep end. Remember this, I told myself, remember this forever because this is when Spring starts, and we laughed, screamed, jumped in.

I thought of that this morning on the bus to work and I wanted to hug my 12 year old self, I love her so. (12 and long straight up and down, my body growing into a vertical axis these days.) It was foggy this morning, and on the bridge you could barely make out the blinking yellow lights of a bridge patrol car stopped mid-span. As the bus drove slowly past it I noticed that all of our heads turned heavy and knew that we were all thinking the same thing though no one said a word simply because the morning bus is supposed to be silent. And then the heads turned back to their laps and their phones, necks wrapped in wool, the market watch section of the paper lengthwise in the proper commuter fold.

I love February, I tell people, because February is when Spring starts, and people laugh at me. Are you kidding? They say, but I’m not and I know. I wanted to tell those people on the bus this morning that it’s true, it’s possible—sometimes you can jump into a pool in February. I remember. Do you?
Apropos of not much but a 7th grade memory of those impossibly scratchy Mexican hoodies that I loved so much back then, I want this ridiculously overpriced Tory Burch hoodie to wear with cutoffs and flip flops. This is when it starts.

Happy Spring,
S