The last days

An atmospheric river has been funnelling water vapour from the opposite end of the Pacific, dumping it in liquid form on Northern California. Softly – a storm as a soggy, smothering blanket.

The last morning of the year had a dead, dormant feel to it, that I then realised was more like a suspension, the space between breaths, an unshowy limbo. In the afternoon, we soaked at the nearby hot springs, the end-of-year brittleness softening and floating away in the steam and warm water.

The first book I finished reading of the new year was Our Evenings, the most recent novel by one of my most beloved authors, Alan Hollinghurst. (His debut, The Swimming-Pool Library, inspired the name of this publication.) I had about 10 pages left at 11.30pm on the 31st, and felt too tired so I finished up the last bit on the first day of the year.

Our Evenings is a rare book: one that I devoured. I read a lot but a lot of my reading is more of the nibbling kind – typically a few pages at a time, and shuffling between several books I have on the go. Progress as increments rather than in sweeping hefts. Our Evenings, however, was something I swallowed up in gulps (and I had little interest in reading other books while doing so). To use that cliche, the novel was a page-turner, though one that captivated me through its textural richness – its beauty and intelligence and characterisations and humanity and haunting moods and verve rather than a propulsive plot.

(Other books in the past year that I devoured in a similar fashion include Consider Yourself Kissed by Jessica Stanley and The Future was Color by Patrick Nathan. I recommend both!)

As the soggy storm continued, we travelled south, to the neighbouring county, to visit friends (who, themselves, were visiting from elsewhere). We brought a load of laundry which we did at the Airbnb where we stayed the night; I charged up my phone and computer. I found myself playing pool in a gay bar for the second time in as many months. Like the previous one, this bar was largely empty; cosy and lonely. The barman was sipping a glass mug of herbal tea.

In less than two weeks I'll be on my way to South Africa, and so these last days are imbued with that impending departure, too. Suitcases have been taken down, and are increasingly populated with things I plan on taking with me (at this stage, mostly books). My perspective has been largely constructive and anticipatory but there was a quiet, sudden sense of loss when something else asserted itself: a reminder there would be people I'm fond of that I won't be seeing for quite some time. This is obvious but until then I hadn't fully felt it – this bereavement, almost, at the sense of time and space opening up between me and them. They say absence makes the heart grow fonder and maybe that is sometimes true, but maybe absence (impending or actual) is also sometimes clarifying, drawing into sharper focus what and who we value, which isn't necessarily invisible during our day-to-day but may be taken for granted or to some degree obscured.