I Don’t Know Where I Am Going

But it smells like sea salt and wood smoke.

I blew a stop sign with tears in my eyes from the wind and the fog rushing past my face, the lights around me haloed in the glimmer of headlights and my heart soared just in front of me, clearing the space for my body to follow.

Flying on my bicycle to the beach.

It is cold outside.

I was bundled up, long sleeves, sweatshirt, jean jacket, fingerless gloves.

But it was exhilarating coming home from the Inner Sunset, the smell in the air reminding me that the cold weather is not just coming, it is here.

It seems a little early, but that could just be me, or it could be that it gets cold here, at the edge of the world, faster, then it did when I was in the Mission District.

The fog has laid claim to my neighborhood and the wind has a bite to it, not a teasing nip, a bite.

It’s not a mean bite yet, but I sense that I am going to be bundling up differently to ride around here when the rainy season hits.

Something that should be addressed soon, the coming November rains.

November is like, uh, next fucking week.

This month is zooming by and no, I don’t know what I am going to be for Halloween.

Probably nothing.

I am not a huge fan of Halloween.

The jackassery wears me out.

Oh, I like to dress up, really, did you see me today?

Flower in the hair, glitter on the nails, sparkle in the leggings, lip gloss, pig tails.

I looked like a juvenile delinquent.

I am a juvenile delinquent, with a few grey hairs sneaking in there.

But I don’t have plans to go do anything.

It falls on a Thursday, which means I will be taking my little girl charge to music class in the Haight and I may dress her up, but myself?

Nah.

Unless I throw on my crinoline just for fun.

I could do that.

Hell, I wear my crinoline any time I feel like I need some fun in the routine.

For it is becoming a routine, slow, sure, steady.

I am finding my way about the work and the neighborhood and the recovery needs are being met and I am seeing how the bicycle is good for getting me to and fro.

I am finding times that work for bedtime and writing time and going to the job time.

I was thinking this morning that I may implement an extra fifteen minutes into my schedule into the day at the beginning by getting up at 6:45a.m. instead of 7a.m. on Mondays, Tuesday, and Wednesdays–to do more of my morning writing.

Thinking about it does not mean that I will, I just found myself with a few extra minutes this morning and really like the pace that I had to do my writing.

Plus, I was thinking of an article a friend had sent me about a person who for the last 13 years has been spending three hours a day doing daily writing.

On top of what sounded like full-time work and raising two kids.

I don’t have the two kids, unless you count the nannying, but I do have the full-time work and I get in about an hour an a half to two hours every day.

I type quite fast.

And I write quite fast.

Some practise at doing both and I can knock out the work far quicker than one would think.

I am not quite up to speed with my fingers finding the keyboard as fast as my thoughts come, but I am not far off.

I can hear the words and there is a pause between the word in my head and the word on the screen, but it is not much and it certainly is not as long as it used to be.

The same for the hand writing, which actually is faster than the typing.

Or perhaps my brain is a little slower in the morning when I am doing the pages.

Regardless, I do the writing and I do the work and it will one day pay off.

It already has in amazing ways.

I feel like people know of me and about me and I am able to share my experiences with a world that I cherish.

I like that my friends have tabs on me.

I like that folks I bump into randomly at 5th and Irving know that I have gone surfing recently and just got a wetsuit.

I find it a way to keep me accountable and not isolated.

Although it is not an excuse to not see my friends.

I like to talk to people face to face and engage that way too.

Much better than reading about it on Facecrack or whatever other social medium you use.

I like that I get information from very diffuse places and people.

I have a lot of odd connections out there to a lot of different kinds of folks from my family to my friends to people I have met at Burning Man, I like the breadth of my community.

But I also like sitting down with a friend and despite being flattered about someone reading about my day on my blog, I would like to see them as well.

I get to see Joanie this Friday and another old friend is coming into town on Sunday and we are grabbing coffee, I haven’t seen her in years, it will be good to catch up.

And I can tell them about the sea and the way it smells at night.

How yes, I look so young and dewy fresh, but it’s just the fog condensation on my cheeks not a new product from MAC.

I don’t know where I am going, I say to myself, but I do know I am going to be writing about it, wherever it is.

Today, it is a room down by the beach lit with candles and filled with music and notebooks and songs in my head.

A wetsuit waits in the closet.

A book waits to be read.

A tea-pot to be filled.

I don’t know how it all works out, but it does.

And I guarantee that the words, despite myself, will continue to come.

Because I don’t know where they are going either.

Just that they are always there for me.

Like the smell of the sea and the soft shrine of smoke adrift in my heart as I sail down the dark streets on my trusty sparkling stead heading off into the Sunset.

Tags: bicycle commute, bicycling, friends, Ocean Beach, postaday, recovery, San Francisco, sea salt, The Sunset, weather, wood smoke, writing