A new home

Of all the details and amenities and selling points that the leasing agents of the world highlight when walking you through a new apartment, it's the nook I gravitate to most in my new Shaw home. The windows extend from floor to the ceiling, and project out by probably three feet, so there are actually three sides of glass and more bright light than I've ever known in a house. I put my yellow chair in one corner, and my old farm desk in the other, and so far, I tend to sit in either depending on the mood or the task, flanked on all sides by plants. I love being still and looking out and seeing the horizon, monitoring the many DC helicopters flying by at night, the unmoving silhouettes of the various landmarks, the lights of Reston flickering in the distance, and the people scurrying about below making big city noise. I try to set aside a few moments each day without phone or computer, right as the sun begins to set, now earlier and earlier in the fall, as a form of simple meditation. I think it's important to stop and notice the many ways no two sunsets are alike.

Recently, occasionally, I've begun thinking about what a move out of this city might look like. Perhaps it is time to finally venture up to New York City, or go further afield again? These are normal, restless thoughts, I expect, given my history, only tempered these days by the chaotic state of the world and a general desire to remain cocooned in your sanctuary. The Samuel Johnson line stays with me: Yet it must be remembered, that he who continues the same course of life in the same place, will have little to tell. 

But recently I drove a Jeep out of the city in the early morning light, passing by the monuments and the Potomac River as life was just beginning to stir, and breathing in that air, I felt in my core that at the very least, I would be lucky to live another year in this place. In the long winter ahead that promises new struggles, I take comfort in this privileged nook, a place to settle, to sit with good words, to have a drink with the best people, and to contemplate the trails walked and the trailheads yet to come as the city forever flickers outside.