It's that time of the year - winter is encroaching, cramping my style. I feel myself fading and drifting off, like a dry leaf on a river current.
I came across this vintage photo online this week, and was entranced. The glamorous woman with a pet cheetah - over-the-top, curious...staged for a vintage ad, or real??? Imagine the folly, the sheer irresponsibility of keeping this magnificent cat as an urban "pet" - crazy stuff. So why did this image draw me in? It had such strong appeal and I wondered why. The more I thought about it, I realized that I saw myself reflected in both the woman and the tethered cheetah.
Like that poor cat, these days I feel trapped by circumstance and the weather. I want to get loose and run for the hills - warm hills, that is! And like the woman in this photo, I find myself zoning out, shopping, tidying, arranging, procrastinating - disconnected and dreaming of the summer months that seem too far away; will they ever arrive? Escapism, internalized emotion, longing for a different reality. It's too quiet, too claustrophobic and I want to scream at the top of my lungs just to know that I still have a voice and some passion - a wild feline yowl complete with flashing green eyes and bristling fur! I wonder how that spectacular tantrum would go over in most spaces? Likely not too terribly well, but it makes me smile inside to think about it (see, there I go again, hiding out within - a sullen child making a blanket fort with clothes and furniture).
One positive sign - albeit rather surreal, considering the raw, face-ripping temperatures... I saw a robin at the university this week. I honestly had to do a double take. It was Valentine's Day, and I joked with the dude sitting beside me that perhaps it was a sparrow wearing red for his sweetheart :)
It's great that I have my coursework to push my mind and energies outside of its selfish, snow-drifted, ice-packed February pathways. It forces me to generate a little friction with my mental muscle when all I want to do is pack it in, cover myself in polar fleece and bed clothes and hunker indoors until it is spring.
Today when I played guitar, I closed my eyes and let my mind drift forward into the future. I just enjoyed the sound of my instrument and the way the strings felt as I plucked, strummed, cajoled - and suddenly there it was, a cool breeze swirling around my bare feet. I could hear the wind chimes wildly clanging outside on the patio - was that the smell of hail in the air; a spring storm?
No, it was too cold - frigid, meat locker-esque; I felt my sad little dream bubble burst. I placed Pearl carefully on her stand and followed the cold trail, wishing I'd put on my moccasins. Had the blizzard ripped the roof off my little house?
Aha...mystery solved... my son left his bedroom window open! OMG... with -30 Celsius temperatures and howling winds - he opened his bedroom window wide, and went outside to play with his pals.
Tonight when I am burrito-wrapped in my heated bed, perhaps I will dream of the cheetah. I'll break free of my leash and run in sun-burnished fields, pausing to lap sweet water from glassy pools, and soaking up the natural glory of the day.
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