A City Dwellers New Year

By: Tanya Ward Goodman

About four days into this New Year, I took my holiday money to a local spa and booked a massage. I’d spent three weeks in the near constant company of my children and while we had a mostly marvelous time, I was in sore need of an hour alone. Bonus if that time included chime-y relaxation music and scented candles. About half an hour into my massage, just when I was drifting along, letting little odds and ends of thoughts bump together in my mind, just when I was sort of nodding off, my massage therapist leaned down and said in her best gentle voice, “There’s a gas leak. We have to evacuate immediately.”

The news pulled me from my dreamy state leaving me to jerk into consciousness like a fish on a line. Reality. What a bummer. Amid murmured apologies, I stumbled into the ladies locker room and pulled my clothes over my oiled skin. Outside, in the parking lot, a glimpse in the rear view mirror assured me that my hair was standing on end, my face a mass of wrinkles from the massage table sheets. So much for that.

I write about this day now because I realize that it has somehow set the tone for all the days that have followed. I am almost through the first month of the year and every day has left me jangled and rattled. Rushing from one thing to the next, picking-up, packing up, driving, driving driving… Despite all my attempts to land gently into this New Year, I have crashed. We have crashed.

We have to evacuate immediately.

Just as I was pulled from a wonderful situation, I can pull myself from a bad one. It’s time. It’s time to start fresh. February, full of chocolate hearts and kind words, is looking like a new year. Another chance to start again.