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March is the anteroom of months. It’s both the end of last year’s winter and the beginning of the new year’s spring. It’s half slush, half-quixotic hope.

I had my first baby in March–a child that arrived nine days late, already a solid little being with startling almond eyes and the appetite of a toddler. I had no idea what I was doing; we two just hunkered down and tried to figure each other out.

I still flounder at the start of every March, for different reasons every year, staggering out of February a soggy, angsty creature whose clothes don’t fit.

But somehow, I slip-slide toward the end of the month, and things start to make sense. Maybe the vernal equinox is what helps get us back on track every spring. It’s that moment, usually, on the 20th or 21st of March, when the entire planet is in balance, both the northern and southern hemispheres have the same amount of daylight as darkness.

This year we could use a little vernal harmony as we emerge like moles into the sunlight after 12 months of shutdowns and loss. Hope is still skittish these days, slipping in and out of the back door. But the numbers are going in the right direction. Vaccines are here in bulk, and while distribution still feels like it was set up by the folks who brought us the Hunger Games, that’s getting better too.

My beloved Aunt Wissie even got her vaccination. She’s been on her own all this time. And she figured out where in Pennsylvania she could get an appointment, then drove hours West early in the morning to get her shot. Wissie always says, “you do the best you can with the tools you have.” And so she has done so for her 80 years. The other day, we talked about the miracle that is the COVID-19 vaccine and how, when she was young, polio terrorized many generations of parents and kids before the vaccine arrived in 1955. They shut down pools and camps every single summer for her whole childhood.

The experts say something approaching normal is coming our way this summer. It’s like we are waiting for a blockbuster movie. And if it were, the trailer would be just a litany of ordinary events, like a newborn being handed off to a string of aunties, or people eating pizza in a booth with other humans after some sort of sports event. There’d be lingering shots of people in cafes writing about old-fashioned banal worries in journals.

But for now, hope, that little wraith, won’t settle down. She remembers all the other times we saw numbers going the right way, and then something happened. So we will keep wearing face coverings for a little longer, maybe even trade up for a new spring mask look.

And while we wait, let’s tally all the things we’ll want to take with us out of this tunnel. And yes, there’s so much much we never want to see again (or wear again), but there’s much to hang on to as well.

For example, let’s not forget how to pay attention to what’s right in front of us. When the boundaries of your world got smaller with fewer distractions, we became much more aware of everything within that circle.

This year has been a master class in observation. Like how we learned to really look at nature–whatever scrap of it was nearby. All the weird berries and bugs and plants and trees were always out there, undergoing dramatic changes every four months. Most of us city-folk just walked on by, hurrying to some restaurant or movie or work—all of which I’d obviously like to hurry to soon. But I don’t want to stop noticing the small pulses of spring as they grow stronger.

Even people under 60 became obsessed with natural phenomena reporting back like breaking news if they found a new alien-looking seed pod in the park. And for a while, when commuter traffic disappeared, it was like someone turned up the bird volume, and that’s all you could hear, other than the haunting sound of ambulances in New York in April.

And in that contained sphere of us, there were the people we quarantined with: The beloveds and the roommates and the kids. On the one hand, the days blurred into endless identical cycles. But in ten years, you’ll see that roommate, and no matter how rocky things got, there will be a bond between you like going to college together or boot camp.

We also had so much time to study the faces of the ones we love, to learn their ways and wants, to see what causes the shadows to appear behind their eyes. We all learned how to maneuver around each other’s moods and patterns like we were all on a ship bumping down the narrow hallways of our confinement.

That knowledge of how to be together for this long is precious. It’s as if we’ve all undergone a new version of that experiment the New York Times wrote about where they asked people who’d just met to stare into each other’s eyes for a certain amount of time and ask each other 36 questions. They fell in love–or at least like.

All this mashing together has been uncomfortable and sometimes painful, especially after the first few months. Yet, we found that familiarity can sometimes breed more love. And that goes for familiarity with ourselves too. Learning to be alone with yourself, knocking into your own faults at every turn, is one of those achievements that serve you well long after forced solitude ends. It’s the ultimate skill. And if you’re lucky, there’s a dog around. Now I know why poet Mary Oliver was always writing about her canines. They are the glue holding civilization together. At the very least, they force us to put pants on and leave the house regularly.

That baby I had in a long-ago March is now back at college, and so is their sibling. Until a few weeks ago, we three were rattling around in our 1100 square feet of Brooklyn, and lord, we fought at first. But I think about how I won’t forget watching the two of them, children of mine, learn to cook together–the sauces, the eggs, so many eggs cooked so many ways. I saw how they moved easily, like watch gears in the small kitchen sharing tasks without words. I had visions of them at my age, making those same dishes in some kitchen somewhere, chopping, handing plates off to each other easily because they also learned how to be grown-ups together during this endless year. So did I.

But then again, I feel as if I have to remember how to be an adult again every March. 💌

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COPING KIT ⛱

<strong>And that is just the point… how the world, moist and beautiful, calls to each of us to make a new and serious response. That’s the big question, the one the world throws at you every morning. “Here you are, alive. Would you like to make a comment?</strong>Herewith, a bit of a challenge from poet Mary Oliver for a muddy and muddled Spring:

–Mary Oliver, Dream Work

We’re Having Trouble Recognizing Each Other In Masks, and It’s Getting Awkward Something for your pandemic scrapbook–amusing stories about the man who mistook his wife for a stranger and a bevy of new Biden administration officials who keep having to re-introduce themselves to each other.

Expert Advice on Getting Through the Next Phase of the Pandemic from surprising sources, like Antarctic researchers.

<strong>Fear, to a great extent, is born of a story we tell ourselves, and so I chose to tell myself a different story from the one women are told. I decided I was safe. I was strong. I was brave. Nothing could vanquish me. </strong></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">To All the Clothes I’ve Loved Before, a meditation on one year of sweatpants, the fashion industry’s existential crisis, and what we miss about dressing up.

—Cheryl Strayed

EVIDENCE OF HUMAN KINDNESS ❤️

Here’s your weekly reminder that creating a community of generosity elevates us all.

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