moon lovers
what soothed, enlightened and moved me in November ~
Dear friend,
While ice skating a few days ago, I looked up at the evening sky and felt my heart leap. The moon was so round and bright and mysterious peaking through the clouds. It felt like I was seeing it for the first time.
The start of this winter has felt different from any I’ve had in Chicago. I’m sure I’ll write more about this once all the feelings and sensations take a clearer shape. For now, I’m trying to look at the winter like an idiosyncratic friend. It necessitates long puffy coats and humidifiers, a repertoire of soups and friends that welcome your runny nose and sleepy spirit into their home. It is a season where the moon winks at you all long night and the sun takes her rest.
The winter also incubates sadness and grief. It invites you to curl under a blanket and check-in with your senses. Allowing our bodies - the great keepers of memory and pain - the space to unfurl and cry out can be cathartic and overwhelming (especially as our personal suffering mirrors and is exacerbated by larger collective waves of trauma and pain). I’m trying not to resent the changing season for those heavier emotions but thank it for calling in the parts of my I often reject or push away.
This month’s playlist is an ode to the moon, the winter . . . the way a season of insularity and hibernation might allow us to greet our deepest emotions with compassion, in community.