The Days are Just Packed

In recent weeks, the days have been flying by. Just yesterday I was out on the farm teaching my favorite high schoolers how to prune tomatoes, watching the early morning fog lift off of the city and the July dragonflies appear to take its place. Wait- that was two months ago by now. Since then, the kids went back to school and so did I. Back to the land of beer pong and forced flirtation, trying to impress others when the only ones we should really be trying to impress are ourselves. Can you tell I miss summer?

The speed at which my life is moving seems to be increasing exponentially and it makes me wonder: is it going to continue in this direction? Will I be sixty years old and one minute later, seventy? They say that time flies when you're having fun, but why is it not the other way around? Why can't those times of boredom, sadness, awkwardness blow over instead of hanging above us like a rain cloud waiting to burst? It really must be because you can't have too much of a good thing. Would the great times in our lives be nearly as great if they lasted forever?

No amount of philosophizing will change the true fact that it is finally fall. And the universe really is designed perfectly, for when I thought I just wouldn't be able to finish one more bike ride in the miserable, muggy Philly heat, fall rolled around. And with it, new characters have entered my life. The old ones never truly leave.

I like to say that I now attend the church of George. I have begun to spend two mornings a week with a neighborhood man, George, working in the garden. He attended a cooking demonstration the nonprofit I work for held at a nearby church, and inquired about ways to get involved. Two days later, he met me at the garden gate at 9 AM, dressed in coveralls and ready to get dirty. This man is an amazing person- at 40-odd years old, he walks everywhere (there are not short distances, mind you) and knows everything about his city. And tells it to me, in what feels like an impassioned, meaningful sermon, while we are there on our hands and knees in the dirt.

He's also trying to get me to spice up my vocabulary, and stop using the words "cool" and "wow" so liberally. "Wow" seems to be the hardest, given that his stories have recently been of deep personal pain. And all I can say in response is wow.

I have no way of contacting George, we just meet at the garden in person. Today I'm being lazy and staying home because of the rain, and I'm almost positive he's out there anyway waiting for me. And for him, standing out there alone in the rain, the time is probably not flying by at all.