My own life. I have been, quietly, making more space for the things on my list. I did the cooking class Priya mentioned — four sessions on technique, a Saturday series, deeply satisfying in the specific way that learning something physical can be satisfying. I went on a second solo hike, a longer one this time, and came home tired in the clean way rather than the depleted way. I have been, in small increments, remembering that I have a self that exists independently of the marriage’s requirements.
The anniversary trip to the coast is planned for April. We’ve looked at the dates; we haven’t booked yet, but we will. Nathan has said, more than once, that he wants to do it right this time. I have said that I’d just like to do it, and that the right will take care of itself if we’re actually present for it.
There is a version of this story where April is wonderful and things click back into place and the marriage is better and the whole difficult autumn turns out to have been necessary. I am not committing myself to that version. I am also not ruling it out. I am holding it as a possibility and watching the accumulation of evidence.
## What the Sea Will Be
I have thought about the coast a lot, across these months. The specific cottage room I’d booked, the window I’d imagined, the sound of the water that I’ve never heard from that particular room but that I’ve constructed in my mind from memory of other coastlines.