seasonally appropriate

When we were young we'd burn fires in the fireplace, in winters at her cabin in the woods huddled together under a blanket as a shelter against the world, in summers on the beaches by my house. The seasons were set and so were our routines. In the spring and autumn there were sometimes bonfires and sometimes fires in the fireplace, but it wasn't set. We didn't have a routine. We did everything imaginable. Those were the seasons that changed us. When we were older our routines burned less bright and even in the mercurial spring and autumn we were less adventurous, less inclined to flights of fancy, and without our traditions to fall back on, I started feeling like there was a fire missing.

It's spring now. Everything is green and bright and beautiful, and it's hot out, but like all heat waves this early in the year everyone knows it won't last. It's not languid like the summer. And this is a spring like the ones when we were young. This is a spring that will change me. So tonight I started building a boat. The ocean is perfectly calm for now, but I know that will last about as long as everything else in the spring. It will be done by summer, and unless something changes I'll set out by the solstice, over the ocean, because I've been on its shores for too long.

And unless something changes, I'll be traveling alone.