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what is to give light must endure burning.
[victor frankl]
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I save Saturdays for dreaming. I wake up late and eat hot sticky cinnamon rolls with my sister for breakfast. We boil tea and watch while the neighborhood dogs leap into our yard and wrestle with Norah and Sadie, lunge and dive and play keepaway with a crumpled plastic flower pot, and we cheer and make bets on when they're going to turn tail and flat-out run from our seven-month-old puppy's relentless and savage pursuit.
On Saturdays, I wear leggings all day and ignore people who helpfully mention to me that leggings don't actually count as wearing real pants, and oh, it's snowing outside. They're Smartwool, I tell them, and turn on our Christmas lights and leave them on all day. I get a strong bitter bhakti chai from the coffeeshop/bike rental place down the street and say things to people like, I like your hair, or, This is the best chai I have ever had, ever. They're a little embarrassed, but I'm not. It's Saturday.
The rest of the week, I'm a little confused. I love Colorado, but I feel temporary here, the same temporary way I've been feeling for years, since I laid awake in my dorm room the night before my first college classes and realized that my parent's house was four blocks away but it wasn't where I'm supposed to go anymore.
The rest of the week, I work at a job where I'm not sure I fit and I walk through Boulder, a town that puts way too much stock in reggae music and money. I wonder whether I'll always be temporary and tentative, struggling through a new job or wondering what I can and can't talk about with my new friends and getting lost in a new place where all the streets have names like Aspen and Pine and Fir and Walnut.
On Saturday, I draw it all back together. This day, I know that I'm in Colorado because it's beautiful and unknown to me, because I didn't want to wake up when I'm eighty-three and realize I forgot to move to this state for even just a little while. I see how the ceramics class I'm taking next month at the Boulder Potter's Guild can mean that when I'm forty I'll open my kitchen cabinets and take out a mug and a plate I made. I see how every time I do this, I'm less afraid, I adapt faster, I love harder and sooner and hold back less. I remember that when I was a child, all I dreamed about was exploring, was going on adventures, and on Saturday I realize I'm being true to her in this.
On these days, I let myself picture a town where I live with those who are dear to me, a garden we sink our palms into, a brightly painted front door with a note reading "Come on in" perpetually tacked to the front. I imagine what I want to create, what I want to build, and I don't let any voice come in and tell me I'm not creative or intelligent or skilled enough to bring it to life. I hear all during the week how it's impossible to do anything good and the only worthwhile motivator is money, and I let it drum against my ears for now. But on Saturdays, I say, No. I'm sorry you have so little heart. But that's not me.
I'm going to learn all I can now so I'll be ready when it's time. I'm going to explore so when I know where I'm going to stay, I know why. I'm going to learn how be a friend, how to love people and not use them now, so I can be a gift to the community I go to, something strong and good. I'm going to learn how to feel lonely or afraid or angry and ride it out anyway, not let it define what I do, the choices I make.
But today, before I've done anything truly terrifying or meaningful, I'm going to declare my independence from things that suck. I'm going to plan my debut into art welding and dream about my road trip up the east coast to the Outsider Art Fair in New York. I'm going to work on my Peace Corps application and wear things that are warm and fuzzy and stupid-looking and only laugh at jokes that I like. I'm not going to care if I feel like I've been misunderstood or if I don't feel cute enough or important enough, because dammit, it's Saturday. Today I have more important things to do.
