Dear future hubster

 Dear future hubster, sometimes those great moments of introspection and reflection don't happen on the days arbitrarily chosen for them. Especially if you just got out of quarantine and had to rush through a working Friday that of course included a meeting until 17:15, preparations for a party that wasn't going to happen, trying to find a balance between not being in a gathering that's conducive for community transmission and not being alone, trying to make not too big a deal of the arbitrarily chosen day of retrospection and still acknowledging it.  Sometimes the slow, peaceful moment of balance, the inventory of what has been and the wondering of what will be happens a day or two later, on an otherwise uneventful Sunday, on the roof watching a dramatic sunset over what is called pretty much the Rocky Mountains in the local language. A moment of grace when it suddenly doesn't feel strange at all that it's 37 degrees on the 2nd of January, that you're sitting n...

 Dear future hubster, I'm sure you (and anybody who's ever met me for longer than 5 minutes) already know how much I dislike when people go away. From a workplace, from a city, from places we called home, from my life.  But do you know how much I love it when they come back? And do you think they know? 

Dear future hubster, if the currently trending word of self-care needs to be pictured with a cosmetic product (which it shouldn't, taking care of your body is basic hygiene & health, but then again, taking care of your whole self is basic hygiene & health, but this is a discussion for a different post), it shouldn't be the face mask. It should be the foot mask. The little sock infused with those AHA thingies that make your feet look like they haven't been carrying you through the rugged terrain of daily existence  for decades. Do you know why?  When you put those little socks on, you can't move . You have to sit there for 45-90 minutes, on your couch, with your coffee/tea/wine/preferred beverage and your book, and not move. You can of course have your tv/phone/other screens on, but you're forced to very literally sit with yourself.  That's where self-care begins. 

Dear future hubster, it is true, some things are not meant to last. Sometimes, there are people in your present that you can't picture in your future. You can't, you don't have the courage to, you don't want to make an effort for. And that's alright. You make your choices, and ideally you own your choices. While you make those choices for your future, try to not forget today. Try to not overlook things, moments, people, that, although have no place in the future, make your present memorable. And more than that. The things, people, feelings that make the moment worth being in. Things, people, circumstances you can unexpectedly, unreasonably, disproportionately grateful for. Now. There's magic in there. Try not to miss it.  The future can wait. 

Dear future hubster, the first time I put on sunscreen, the smell of it hits me every time. It smells like summer, and not just heat and water. It smells like breeze, air, literally and figuratively. It smells like freedom, even though I'm not sure what from; it smells like long days and late nights, music, mosquito bites, being young and a little reckless. I write about this every year, because it happens every year, all my hardworking blood cells do their little dance and organize themselves into tacky motivational posters to tell me to live, laugh, love. And I do, I sleep less, I feel more, everything is a little more intense once the sunscreen is on.  Last year all this intensity had nowhere to go. All we had was hopes being crushed, plans constantly postponed, grief, anxiety, nothing to look forward to. This year it feels very cautious, not-wanting-to-get-hopes-too-high, watching what others do, envying them for it, FOMO creeping back in, anxiety over how to do these things ag...