Year Two — Page 21

Jan at the kitchen counter at 8:24 AM, both hands on the chipped clay cup, tea steaming

#01

The Counter, the Same Counter

The counter is the counter.

The cup is the cup. The cardigan is the cardigan — which means it has, this year, stopped announcing itself as new and started just being on. The light is spring light. I am thirty. Have done this — espresso, tea, ten minutes, the standing — every morning since the spring I came back from Hangzhou. The ritual is two years old. The ritual is a Tuesday. The ritual is older than the cardigan and younger than the cup. I am at the counter.

Jan at her standing desk, the open — visibly its second one (a small label on the spine reads *No

#02

The Second Planner

The first planner ran out of pages in December.

Thought I wouldn't fill it. Also thought, until the day I filled it, I wouldn't like having filled it. The second is the same brand. Same four dollars. Same fifty-two-weeks-and-some-spillage. Bought it on a Tuesday. Started inking it Wednesday. This morning, written sat—pottery (yr 2!!), and put two exclamation points after. The exclamation points are evidence. The handwriting is mine. The weeks are mine. The first one is on the desk where I can see it. I'll probably keep both.

Jan by the window in Sunday-at-four light, holding tea — Hair down with the soft cream headband

#03

Sunday at Four (Five)

Sunday at four is its own weather.

First Sunday I noticed peace and was tired. Sunday before the snap I noticed peace and was heavy. Sunday after the trip I noticed peace and was settled. Sunday last fall I noticed peace and was lit. This Sunday I'm noticing peace and I am, in some unfussy way, home in it. The Monday-feeling is in the next room. We've been roommates for three years. Learned each other's schedules. The light is going. So is the tea. I am, this Sunday, just at four.

Jan at her wheel station in the Brooklyn pottery studio, mid-centering a fresh lump of clay

#04

The Pottery Class, Again

Year two of pottery started at 10:04 AM on a Saturday.

Studio smelled the same. Wheels sounded the same. Ruth at the wheel next to mine, as she's been every Saturday for fifteen months. She said good winter? I said good winter. I said good winter? back. Good enough, she said. Didn't, having sufficiently caught up, speak again for the rest of the hour. The clay was the clay. Hands knew the centering this year in a way they didn't last year. Made a small bowl. The bowl was uneven. Kept it. Ruth, beside me, made something better than I did. She's been doing this since she was thirty-three. Sixty-one now. I am, today, halfway between us. I have time.

#05

The Eighth Pot

The windowsill last December had seven small pots and Greg.

This spring, it has eight. The eighth one is the smallest. Said, in winter, I was running out of windowsill. I have, in fact, not run out. A quarter-inch between the seventh pot and the eighth. Will, sometime in May, be a ninth. The eighth pot has a cutting from Sarah in California. The cutting may root. The cutting may not. The pot is the pot regardless. The windowsill is fuller than it was. The windowsill is the same width it was.

Jan walking down Manhattan Ave in late-April spring light, hands in the cardigan pockets, the Headphones again out (wrapped around the phone in the tote)

#06

The Walk, Listening

Walked the eleven blocks again.

Without headphones. April version has more people on the sidewalk, fewer in coats. A man selling tulips out of a green bucket. A small dog, not interested in me. The wind was the April wind. Listened. Last fall, walking without headphones for the first time in years — the not-listening had been a thing I had to undo. The listening today wasn't undoing anything. The listening was the way I walked now. Eleven blocks. A bucket of tulips. A small dog. The wind. Didn't stop for the tulips. Didn't need them. Wasn't the person who needed flowers to mark a Tuesday. I was just at the walk.

Jan kneeling on a spread-out section of newspaper in the kitchen, mid-repotting Greg into a terracotta pot

#07

Greg, the Year-Two Pot

Greg's been in her year-one pot for two years.

The terracotta I'd bought her two winters ago — which I thought was a generous size — was now full of roots that had gone around three times. Read the small article again. Bought a larger terracotta. Spread the newspaper. Greg was, as always, uncomplaining about her own roots. Apologized for letting it become a thing. Patted the new soil down. Told Greg the bigger pot was another upgrade, a word I now use about my own life two or three times a year. She and I have, in our small Wednesday way, an arrangement. I bring the water. She does the growing. Both of us have, in this apartment, gotten taller.

Jan at her standing desk in late afternoon, phone in hand, the — a small green waveform mid-recording

#08

The Wednesday Voice Note

Wednesday voice note to Mom.

Thirty-eight seconds. About Sarah's basil cutting maybe-rooting in the eighth pot. She'll respond in three to nine hours — about her sister's jasmine, probably, the way it needed three months to root. Had, in my entire life until last year, sent her three voice notes total. This year, thirty-some. Some about plants. Some about weather. Some about nothing — the way friends send voice notes about nothing. My mother is, now, also a friend.

Jan at the kitchen table in evening lamp-light, the open

#09

The Third Notebook

The third notebook started on a Monday in March.

Filled the second in late November, on the page that began the cup chipped two weeks ago. The first two are on the desk. They are not, exactly, finished—they are simply full. The third is mostly blank. The third has, tonight, two sentences on its second page. Year two. The practice has become a life. Read it back. Didn't know what else to write. Thought, for the first two notebooks, that the practice was the thing. The thing, it turns out, is something the practice became while I wasn't watching. Don't know what to call this. Doesn't need a word. The lamp is on. The cat is on the chair. I am at the table.