One of the greatest joys in my life is to move unselfconsciously: to quickly, gracefully, do the thing that is in front of me, speaking or writing, dressing, walking, catching with the smooth loop of the basketball star the cup falling from the top shelf and putting it back in place. I’m often clumsy for precisely this reason, in that I try to try to do things with this unconscious grace when I haven’t earned the right, either because I’m not paying attention or because repetition and practice have yet to write the grooves into my mind that would allow me to act with such an animal elegance.
But spending hours everyday in the tiny booth where we sell Katie’s glass and butterfly sculptures has forced me to slow down, lest I destroy with a stray gesture of my frankly too large frame some precious thing, or knock over a shelf, or smack a customer in the face.
It’s even bled into my everyday life, and I find myself moving more deliberately as, for example, I take off my scarf on the subway: carefully moving so as not to impinge on others' space, right hand unknots while the left pulls the length of it around my neck and, without allowing it to drag on the ground, I gather it into my now free right hand and bunch it into my bag with what feels like ridiculous slowness and concentration.
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One year ago: Kinda True
Two years ago: Barking at Midnight
Three years ago: Nostalgia
Seven years ago: Wound Up
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