Changing seasons

Tonight I got home from class a little after 9 and took the pup on his evening walk. Two months ago, it was still daylight when I got home from class. The pup and I would enjoy a stroll in the waning sunlight, passing dozens of people on our way through the neighborhood. Tonight, it was cool, damp and dark.

Summer is gone. Fall is peeking through the thinning leaves on the trees. Two months hence, I'll be wearing gloves and turning my collar against a cold, wet wind.

But it's not just in this physical world that I can sense the changing seasons. My life itself seems to be on the cusp of one season and another.

I'd like to believe it's just a pensive mood. That the change in the weather is affecting my outlook. That the cold I've been trying to kick for two weeks has distorted my perspective.

But last night, on the way home from class, I told S2 that I kept hearing Fleetwood Mac's "Landslide" in my head, particularly the verse, "Can I sail through the changing ocean tides? Can I handle the seasons of my life?"

I said to S2, I feel like a season is changing.

We're the same age, S2 and I. And so I felt unsettled when she nodded and said, "I think you're probably right. I feel something changing, too."

But what the hell is it?

It can't be that my body is going to shit. My body went to shit a long time ago, and it's actually on its way back to something better. Nor do I think it's my approaching birthday: Number 38. Numerical age has never been a problem for me (though, upon turning 35, I did gulp rather hard when I realized I was half way to 70).

It can't be my gray hair. I've been dealing with that since 17, and for the past nine months of coloring it, I've looked more youthful than I have in a decade.

So I don't think it's physical. I'm not even sure it's about the loss of my youth. Except for the damnable cold I've had for nearly two weeks, I feel more energetic and more attractive than I can recall feeling in many, many years.

But there is something changing. Some phase, some season, is ending.

Was it the one in which I might have had children? Was it the one in which I might have seen career "success" if I'd stuck with something for long enough? Was it the one in which I might have been expected to be married? Was it the one in which, had I bothered to do *one fucking thing* in a traditional way, I might have ended up with a set of fine china or some real silverwear?

Or is it a season of discontent that is coming to an end? Is it the insecurity of youth that is falling by the wayside? Is it the part of my life in which I let others influence my choices too much, in which I worked on blending in (and failed!), in which I was more fearful of bold moves, that is now taking a backseat to something different?

I honestly couldn't tell you which is the case. I don't know which season is passing, and I don't know which is coming. But I feel something changing.

I suppose it doesn't matter. Life has its seasons. They change. We have no option of going back, so we go forward.

I told S2 the other night that I have no real goals; I've only ever wanted to be a hedonist. That is, essentially, true, but my particular brand of hedonism would go beyond your typical gluttony, sex free-for-all, draping myself in sensuously soft materials while naked, nubile nymphs place my feet between their breasts and rub me with delicious-smelling oils while Yo-Yo Ma plays Bach's cello suites nearby.

There would be all that, of course. Everyone has to have aspirations.

But my version of hedonism would include a lot of adventure and a fair amount of shameless risk-taking, in between which I would relax in the aforementioned manner (nymphs, Yo-Yo Ma and all). I would travel and explore relentlessly.

I can't figure what else there is to life than the knowing of as much of it as possible (comments made Monday to Dr. M about not wanting to learn certain topics notwithstanding -- it's a matter of focusing what I do with my precious bodily resources). I make the effort to keep my mind open and inquisitive, and I try to live my life thusly, whether or not I make the measure of hedonism.

Even so, it feels like a part of me is standing on Pacific cliff and seeing the curvature of the earth for the first time. Seeing the sun setting there, a voice within is saying, But wait a minute! Don't go just yet. I'm not ready to relinquish this.

As if I have a choice.

Each end begets a beginning. With any luck, it will be my favorite season of all.