Sometimes it Rains like Glitter

Rain is coming down in streams, the wind whistling and howling through slats in the wooden fence around our back garden. I’m sitting on the floor next to my door that leads outside and I can feel the chill in the air coming in against my bare feet. Occasionally, a gust slams against the bushes and leaves dance like green snowflakes in the air before settling on the grass. It looks greener than usual, dotted with beads of fresh water, radiant against the gray sky. Roses are already blooming down the road on a twisting stem of thorns that snakes along the top of a fence. Pink roses. Pale pink like cotton candy, petals with graceful curves.

In New York, it is snowing and I remember this last year as well, the way London welcomes Spring more quickly, the crocuses springing quietly up from the dirt, the naked branches of trees sprouting the first buds.

Spring is for new beginnings and that is exactly what this month is all about. I’m starting a new job on Monday at The London College. It means I can walk to work through Portobello Market every morning, passing the vendors with colourful vegetables and vintage coats and shoes. It means new horizons, new opportunities, new contacts and a new environment.

On top of that, I’m focusing more on freelance writing this year, putting time into developing a business plan, sending queries, promoting, nitpicking at my image and carving out my niche. I have a few projects in the works already.

Beyond that, I’ll soon be putting some sub-editing hours into Seven Magazine as they get ready to launch a brand new website.

I’m working with the Haute staff as Arts & Culture Editor planning the second issue of the quarterly magazine, interviewing people and writing articles, recruiting writers and photographers.

I’m also revamping The Traveling Mag Project to minimise shipping costs and loss of books, bringing it closer to the participants by expanding on the online version, The Homebody Mag, and posting regular scans of the books while they’re in circulation.

Sitting here thinking of all I have to look forward to this year, I have every reason to be excited. S and I celebrate one year together this Sunday, my brother comes to visit in about a week and we’re heading off to Amsterdam. In March, S and I are spending a weekend in Budapest. My parents and a few friends are visiting in May. In September, a big group of us are planning a trip to America – New York and California.

I think the rain is beautiful, the way it’s clinging now to colourful clothespins hanging from the washing line. It’s slowed to a mist, with a barely-visible steam-like quality. It reminds me of Niagara Falls. When I touch the glass of the windows in front of me, they are like ice, as if they would crack under a tap of my fingertips. Heat radiates behind me and I’m grateful for this house because I’ve fallen for it and it finally feels just like home now. Just right.

I love to keep myself busy, working toward my dreams even if it’s work experience or my own unpaid projects. It’s something like the rain, seeing the beauty in something that other people may find miserable. It’s streaming down the windows and clouding my vision, but it shimmers and shines if you train your eyes on the right spots. Eventually it sinks into the ground and from it sprouts life, beautiful blossoms that take time and a bit of nature’s love to create. The rain comes when the blossoms are alive and it comes when they die. It never stops being raining; there are only lulls.