1. Music – R&B, salsa, dance music from the early 2000s. Rediscovering old sounds, savoring new albums like sugar cubes on my tongue, letting the sweetness slowly engulf every inch of me until I’m buzzing and joyful and looking for more.
2. Sun – chasing it, in the car at sunset hoping for just a glimpse on the horizon. On lucky afternoons when the settling light bursts across the window like liquid bubblegum, loud and intense and screaming it’s goodbye as it melts into the distance.
3. Cop dramas – honestly do these ever get old? I could watch Law & Order deep into the night without realizing the daylight has been sucked away and replaced with excitement and nerves and questions as the detectives and attorneys leave everything on the table.
4. Long walks – these past few months have led to some of the longest walks I’ve ever gone on in my life. Especially notable because a lot of them were solitary. I think a lot of people can reflect over this year and 2020 and think about how much time they’ve spent alone, but there’s something about walking outside, on a trail or in a park, with nothing but your thoughts and some background music. It’s entertaining, boring, stressful, therapeutic, and soothing, all at different points. It is a way to relieve frustration, to drink cold air deep into lungs that have been gasping for days, cabin fever unrelenting and unavoidable. I’ve gone on walks with almost everyone in my family, and there’s something about moving in unison that creates an intimate space for openness. I’ve never felt closer to people I’ve known my whole life, and I’ve never felt more at home in myself.
5. Libraries – I very often humble-brag about being a proud member of like 4 different libraries from around the east coast, as a side-effect of moving around a few times. And let me tell you, having this kind of access to an endless array of e-books has been an absolute godsend. With just a click of a button, I can send basically any e-book I want straight to my electronic device of choice on a whim. I absolutely love it. Is this how rich people feel about ordering whatever on Amazon? There’s something so satisfying about just getting anything you want immediately. 12-year-old me is screaming right now, and not just because she’s waitlisted to read the latest Stephanie Meyer release - I’m so hype about Midnight Sun coming out, and I don’t care who knows it.
Photo courtesy of Aniket Bhattacharya.