Walking on Sunshine

I secretly love Monday mornings. I have to work, but not until the afternoon, and I have a list of things to do but I know they'll get done. I don't love Monday mornings more than I love, say, the leisurely weekend mornings spent snuggling and savoring our coffee, but I love Monday's place in the rhythm of the week, the sense of a fresh start -- even if it also means a fresh to-do list and a reminder of the things I put off over the weekend. Monday makes promises it can't always keep, but I appreciate its can-do attitude.

I commute on Tuesdays and Thursdays and they're long days, but on the other weekdays I like to take a quick walk once Dawn is off to work. It's chilly, but I like the cool air and the signs of life around the apartment complex: people warming up their cars or walking their dogs or hanging out on the stoop for a morning smoke. Sometimes a maintenance worker zips by on a golf cart, on the way to fix someone's garbage disposal or unclog a drain.

Today, despite the cool temperatures, the day feels remarkably springlike. The sun is shining and the wind can't quite make up its mind about how gusty to be. I've been noticing the days getting longer; the light is changing. This is good and bad because while of course it's pretty, I also have this inexplicable anxiety about spring days. They feel odd to me, like something's not quite right.

I've looked this up, and it's apparently a thing. My oldest daughter has it, too, and we compare notes sometimes. The best guess is that our generalized anxiety, however mild, leaves us somewhat overwhelmed by the expectations of spring, a kind of sensory overload. Spring is the overexuberant Labrador puppy to winter's tired, old, but otherwise undemanding tabby.

It's still too cold for any of that to hit me, though, and I just enjoy the morning. As grumpy as I can seem when pressed to weigh in on Big Issues -- to me, we're just a bunch of primates who don't actually know how to handle our oversized cerebrums, and this will probably come back to haunt us, so no, I'm not going to jump on your religious or political or philosophical bandwagon -- I genuinely do find life interesting. People, too, really. The world is no end of entertainment, and this morning it's got some good cinematography going for it. The mise-en-scene is working for me.

After my walk, I finish up the breakfast dishes, put in a load of laundry, and a take a bath. I love hot baths, and by "love hot baths" I mean "I have a bath problem." Like meth or heroin, it leaves me wrinkled, but unlike those things it's relatively cheap and doesn't rot my teeth out. I'm calling it a win.

After that, I'm off to tackle that to-do list. Even if there aren't any papers to grade (and they'll start rolling in soon enough), there are emails to catch up on, class announcements to make on Blackboard, errands to run. That laundry I put in earlier isn't going to fold itself, and I think I need to make an appointment for an oil change. There's plenty to do, and Monday is getting impatient.

For now, though, I might just open the blinds and get one more cup of coffee.