Happy Summer Solstice! My whole thing lately is trying to make summer feel like vacation when I was a kid, when I had a huge, beautifully aimless stretch of time to do whatever I wanted. “Whatever” then meant taking lots of naps, playing outside, reading for hours. Starting a lemonade stand, cutting up catalogs to make “special picture books,” recording songs off the weekly top 40 show and making up dances to them, classes and lessons at the Y — all mundane yet gloriously chilled-out childhood summer things. You could sort of just exist and enjoy life in a more sensory, visceral way. You didn’t feel a pressure to make time feel anything more than what it was. Summer then was just freaking fun, and fun is definitely something I’m into these days.
Of course, I’m a grown-up now and that (sadly) means I have to work. And so far this June has been full of all kinds of social obligations, too, everything from birthdays to recitals to weddings to out-of-town visitors. I’m down with that, but it’s not exactly the leisurely aimless vacation feeling, you know, especially for a highly sensitive true-blue introvert like myself. I’m so out of practice in being social. Plus, it’s the weeks before my birthday, which have always been peculiarly tiring for me; I call it “twelfth-house time,” because astrologically, the sun is in the 12th house in a chart, being all hermetic and introspective and chilled-out. But I’m looking at the rest of the season and I’m getting my plan together and keeping my game tight, and this is what I want to do with the rest of the season.
Ride Horses
So, yes, I periodically talk about horses. And it’s been hard, because for a long while, I lived in places where riding was mucho, mucho expensive — talking like $100-150 an hour expensive for a private session or lesson. But now I live in a place where it’s not, and when it gets nice out, I take advantage!
Riding is pretty much my jam. It is by far the most peaceful, relaxing, Zen-communing thing I do. It makes me feel both gentle and fierce inside. Plus, it works your core in way less of a neurotic way than Pilates. Plus you get to hang out with beauties like this sweet lady:
I’ve been riding every week since late spring, and it is kind of the best thing I’ve done for myself. For the horse-curious, I ride both English and Western. I am not a fancy dressage person or a hunter/jumper; I really just want to pleasure-ride, do a little flatwork and hacking. Trails are my aim, just me, a horse, some forest or fields and a horizon in front of me. Bliss.
Lounging Poolside
I was slightly scandalized recently to find out that the pool I went to as a kid — the one where my parents would drop us off every Saturday afternoon for hours on end — was the place where gay men in my city went to hook up with other gay men. I mean, whatever, people do what they do — I was just surprised that I was a kid and SO OBLIVIOUS to the party in the changing room! These days, my gym has a pool that is pretty ace, and I like to go there just to sit in my swimsuit and read books. I knew I grew up the day I realized I was fond of adult swim, because then there’s no little monkey grabbing onto me randomly when I do venture into the water — I’m like the type of person that kids love to climb on. Maybe I look more like a jungle gym than I think.
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