Growth

People in the Pacific Northwest get really hung up on “Junuary,” when we think we deserve Spring but instead have a month of our regular weather. But in all the (nearly 9) years I have lived here, nobody talks about how amazing May is. a-May-zing. Okay, I’ll work on something better…

This was already my favorite month, because growing up in the New York area it meant a particular shift to the smell in the air, lilacs, my birthday, and the imminent end of the school year. Every year in Tacoma/Seattle, we have a stretch of weather that reminds me of those fantastic May things, even if the smell is different and the lilacs are too early. This month has been no different, except this time the yard is overgrown and I have a bike short tan instead of a farmer’s.

Enough great things have happened this month, that it helps me feel like I am emerging more and more from a state of grief. Today marks 9 months, and with a little bit of sunshine I feel like I am growing and setting stronger roots into my current life.

Speaking of growth, I think Paul would have been pleased by the new rack on the elk at the freshly opened McMenamins Elks Temple. This building project has been on the horizon since they day we moved here, and we were impatient to see it happen. I’m sad he never got the chance to go in, but I’ll think of him whenever I do.