Merely Circulating

On the first day of the New Year I always try to do a little bit of everything - everything that I enjoy and that I intend to pursue in the coming year.  It rained all night, and I lay in bed listening to it for a long time.  Then I did my usual Tai Chi on the covered deck, but this morning I focused on slowing down more, on breathing, on feeling as if I am a part of the rain dripping on the roof and the fog rolling through the underbrush below me.  Why am I always in such a hurry?  I decided to not wear a watch all day.  To merely circulate.

I almost always run on New Year's Day, but (see previous post) we ran yesterday and I ended up completing nine miles.  So I donned my Gore-tex and walked down our road, enjoying the sound of rain on my hood, watching the fog rise up ahead of me on the road, seeing the reflection of the trees in the puddles, smelling the sour fragrance of wood smoke from the old farmhouse in our valley.  I am going to run or walk as much as I can this year.

Later in the morning I found time (a curious phrase, that - to "find time") to write in this blog, and to read - I am going to do more of each this year.  After lunch I drove up to Town and delivered two big slices of the apple pie I baked yesterday to my mother-in-law.  I am going to bake more this year, and do more nice things for the people I love.  Then I went to the Civic Center and worked out hard in the gym, surprised to find only a small handful of "Resolutionaries" pounding away on the treadmills and ellipticals. 

Then I rambled around Highlands - such lovely sights to see merely circulating in the gauzy fog.

When I returned home, Martha wanted to walk down the road, so I walked again, and Martha pointed out some smaller things around us that I had overlooked on my walk this morning.  I am going to pay closer attention, and listen to my wife more carefully this year, she will be glad to read!

Now I am going to play the piano for awhile, and perhaps read some poetry.  I have made a crooked little stack of the books I am going to read over the next two months, Christmas gifts, and it includes the poetry of Leonard Cohen and Tomas Tranströmer and a new biography of Wallace Stevens.  (At least, these are my good intentions.)  Maybe I will read once again The Pleasures of Merely Circulating , the perfect poem for this rambling day:

The garden flew round with the angel,
The angel flew round with the clouds,
And the clouds flew round and the clouds flew round
And the clouds flew round with the clouds.