Signs of Spring

This weekend has been one of those glowy spring ones where the sun is hot on your skin but the breeze is cool and the blossoms absolutely reek of perfume in such a slutty manner, luring the bee's in with the overpoweringly sweet scents of a trashy hoe in a club.
It has been bare tanned legs and gauzy tank tops that flutter open in the back to dry off the sprinkle of perspiration, and cut off jean shorts that desperately need patches on the back, and playing basketball slowly and lazily on the back driveway.
It has been sunglasses all day all the time, and broad smiles, and good tired silences, and drinking gin and tonics in the cool of Jonah's basement with Sean and Mikhail and Joel, and running around on the grass barefoot trying not to step on any prickles.
It was admitting defeat to the idea of going out after dark to a pub with loud noisy people, and instead curling up in a three-way cuddle puddle to watch the Muppet movie: the first step in our "bike gang" (the Rivervalley Riders) bonding. And no, really, we all ride bikes. Like, mountain/road bicycles. We have bandanas.

This weekend I fell half in love with Sean, but I think it was just the wild whipping wind and the flowers and that blood-quickening nonsense. I felt the same amount of affection to the world in general when we ate dinner outside every night, so maybe "love" is too strong a word. We ate well, too, all fresh herbs and gazpacho soup and chocolate dipped strawberries, and cold white wine that bit at your throat. Sean was just the human embodiment of that affection, the physical manifestation of Spring. Full of energy and life and a young, smooth attractiveness, a well-spring of the ideas and songs and thoughts.
But no, I don't really love Sean. I haven't loved anyone in that way for a long time now.

This weekend D and I got up early Sunday morning and strolled down our back alley to the park overlooking the river, and lay on the grass and cheered on the chef who works at our restaurant as he ran past in the annual Mother's Day Marathon. It is tradition now. And this evening, D and J and I snuck out on to the roof of our house with a blanket and watched the sky drain of it's colour and the bugs come out and hover over our heads, and we listend to quiet music and sang and talked. It was bittersweet because we won't be able to hang out very often anymore. Every time we do stuff just the 3 of us I try so hard to just be in the moment, but there is always that niggling thought in the back of my mind: savour this. Remember this. Treasure this. It might be the last time. Maybe this is it.

This weekend is one of the few weekends I have left in this house. This home, I guess. And I'm tired of thinking about it. I'm tired of crying at the drop of a hat. I cry ALL THE TIME NOW. I had gotten pretty good at holding back my tears for whatever reason, but the past couple of months I am a veritable water feature. Crappy tv shows make me cry. Dumb movies. Books. Newspaper articles. Somebody saying something. I need to figure out a way to hold it in again. Pinching my arm doesn't work anymore. Suggestions?

And this weekend, maybe because I had no expectations, surprised me with it's loveliness. It's beauty, it's grace, it's enjoyment. This weekend was about filling up the potholes left over from winter, repairing the damage done by the frost and the darkness. About healing and growing and recharging my batteries in the sunlight, drying my clean sheets in the sunlight, reading by sunlight, exploring and loving by sunlight. The start of this spring is so radically different from last spring that I can't help but believe that it is a sign that this will be not just a good summer, but an incredible summer.