I pull the shades open to find rain spattering against the window-glass, then dive back under the soft-polka dotted coverlet, homing to the warmth T radiates. For a while we lie this way, just breathing. From here only the crowns of trees are visible: a crosshatching of black and white, a tangle of rain-drenched twigs against the milky grey of the early morning sky.
Eventually, I switch on the light beside my pillow, and T unfolds from bed. I've been crushing on the beard he's grown over this winter, and I can't help but smile watching him on jeans and a sweatshirt. Soon the warm place that he left has been filled by Clover, her sweet yogi-self pressing against me, tail wagging. I tousle her velvet soft ears, and when we've sufficiently greeted each other she curls into a ball, and keeps my feet warm as I write.
T brings tea, and from the next room over I can hear the boys in their room chattering in the perpetual way they do, and I fill page after page in the yellow legal pad with whatever comes to mind until the half hour mark, when I put my pen down, refill my tea, and head to the yoga mat with T for a half-hour morning practice.
This has been our ritual every morning for the past week, and I love what it's done to set my mornings right.
It's been my goal this year to build simple routines that sustain my core. Rituals that soften the edges and simplify the moments and reduce some of the stress I find all too easily creeps in.
Another ritual is simply to let the weekend be what it is best: a time to rest. Instead of filling it in with doing, I'm practicing doing not so very much. Sitting all morning with more tea in the big white chair by the windows watching the rain while Sprout puts out fires in the play castle he's set up across the room, and then heading to the studio after a snack to make some new art, Sprout in tow while Bean hangs out in his bed reading and organizing collections.
weekending