Sitting Alone in a Quiet Room

Strong winds started blowing two nights ago.

The first night it rained and, with the temperatures in the 30′s, most of the snow melted. The wind felt mild and spring-like, almost like an embrace.

Yesterday morning the wind changed direction and brought frigid temperatures and blowing snow. I went out for a short walk and to buy some bread and tangerines, but I didn’t walk down to the lighthouse like I had planned to. When the wind blasted icy snowflakes into my face, it felt like a slap, icy shards digging deeply into my skin.

Wind howling outside my window

I came home, made a cup of minty tea, and sat huddled under a blanket. It took a while to warm up my hands and frozen feet.

I sat alone in a very quiet room.

Outside, the wind howled and wailed, discernible in the clouds of flurries it was tossing, twirling and toying with.

I parted the lace curtains to have a clear view and sat on the sofa facing the front window. I reached over for my knitting, the silky gray yarn I am using to make a scarf with for my nephew Sasha.

The pattern is simple, consistent and meditative. Quickly, I fall into a trance and forget that my fingers are moving.

For a few hours I sit alone, knitting, in a very quiet room.

Reflections come and go, as well as feelings, musings, memories.

If I had to retrace the web of thoughts that lead from one trail to another, I could never do it. So I don’t try. I give myself the permission to simply be.

People I have loved and still love, visit me. I let them. And those boundaries between now and then, between reality and imagination, between life and death, are blurred and obscured like the swirling haze of wind and snow.

For a long time I sit in a very quiet room. But not alone. Not alone at all.