Advice from an ice queen
Here’s to a month of new beginnings in an ice city. Or maybe more like an ice country with the iguanas raining from the trees in Florida and the bitter temperatures frosting the Midwest and Northeast with lows these states have not seen in years. 2018: decent so far, just a matter of roughing the cold weather and trying to cope with the state of the country without shattering with worry. The coldest place is waiting on the platform for a train to come while your phone is trembling in your hand and there are strange omens all the way down the scroll. There’s a little weakness here. There’s a little desire to let go of will, to wait for fate, to trust in astrology, to believe in the tarot. It’s said that we’re all entering Saturn, a harsh and serious planet. These baffling horrors might make you want to throw your hands up in the air, asking fate to decide. I did that once and my goldfish named Jack died on the floor, no one person or goddess intervened. Sometimes action is required, even if it's just an inhale.
As a wise woman once said in a place of stagnancy, the cold never bothered her anyway. And did she get through it in the end? I never saw Frozen, but I’m assuming she did. We can handle this, we can move with grace, dance with destiny without making excuses for ourselves. The cold can bother us all the way, but it isn’t the heartbeat inside. It’s not the glow. It’s not the octopus I will one day give birth to. I’ve got an octopus, you see, and it moves like a synth pop song in space. I’m sure you’ve got something glorious there too. Faith is going to get you part way, but not the entire distance. You must run, you must name that strange being inside you because it won’t honor itself.
They told us it was a bomb cyclone to scare us. But they don’t know there’s not much we can’t handle.
The holidays happened like every year, a moment to slow down like a frog in hibernation during winter months. When your work gets put on hold your life comes into perspective. After a respite of relaxation and family time you begin to see glimpses of what your soul feels. A return to New York City and a return to work is a matter of harsh bewilderment. In December we left one city, and in January we return to a different, much colder one.
Everyone I spoke to gave up on resolutions. “It’s not the resolution they said, it’s more like elements that I want to focus on.” And they’re right. To fix any one thing is like asking a slew of others to fall from a shelf. Let me grasp just one more thing and try to balance them all. You don’t have to be strong to bare all that you face, but you must not give up, if not for your sake, but for the sake of your octopus. In the end a new years resolution should not have the option to fail. A resolution to find yourself can not go wrong, even when the path is dark. Everything breathes and after drought you will be satiated in the end.
