the guez

          The plan was to- well there  was  no plan.  The plan was to fly to a faraway continent and have an adventure.   But a relentless exhaustion paired with a mild fever and a midsummer cold made the prospect of adventure incredibly unappealing, and as my heavy head and sick spirit contested, I was Burnt Out . So burnt out in fact, that with some show of drama, I stepped off the airplane right before it was to fly away, grabbed my suitcase, and took myself home to bed, unsure if I was a coward/weakling or a person of great will, but relieved to be sleeping in the northern hemisphere, in quiet old Greenpoint with my cat under my arm.  I had just finished three weeks of travel and work/travel and work, and was, as they say, done.             In the morning, I made a list of all the things I would do on my new vacation in Brooklyn, and then proceeded to ignore the list.  Instead, I spent a week napping and reading on couches, beds, parks and park benches.  It was the ki

         I spent the better part of my childhood summers under water: summercamp, grandparents’ pool, beaches, lakes, swimming holes.  Summer meant water.  Summer meant being submerged, the lifting of my hair in the enveloping cool, the constricting feeling of my lungs in the evenings after holding my breath in the deep end all day.  I took it for granted.  Summer and swimming were synonymous.            Then came adulthood.  Then came New York.  The reflection of heat bouncing off concrete to more concrete.  The oppressive humidity, the crush of traffic to the beaches, the polluted river one block away.   When I first moved to Greenpoint eight summers ago, I put wet washcloths in the freezer and draped them on my shoulders during the heat waves.  In the evenings, I went down to the river and watched the water lap the pilings on java street but didn’t dare dip a toe tip in. The river's smell of earth and water drifted up to my living room window and made me wild.  Such an ache