That Life Altering Moment in Italy

One summer I traveled to Italy with a dear friend. We stayed for two weeks in a house in Tuscany with some of her friends, two European couples both with young children. On our last full day there before heading back to Rome, after a morning out and about, she and I found ourselves alone in the big, beautiful, usually noisy house. 

Being both a little compulsive, we of course started packing and readying for our departure. Then all of a sudden we stopped. What were we doing?! We took a deep breath, smiled at each other, opened a bottle of wine, and made our way to the porch overlooking the Tuscan hills. There we sat and talked and breathed and  took in the day. 

I think of that moment often. I thought of it today as I ran through the snow. It's been a long winter. And believe me, I'm as tired as everyone of jumping slush puddles and shoveling icy sidewalks.  It is so easy to hate the snow, to feel overwhelmed by shovels and boots and coats and lost mittens and on and on. I often forget that the choice is mine and so I should make a good one. Instead I choose to curse the endless winter or whatever it is that I feel is getting in my way that day. 

But if I stop hating it for a second, the snow is so beautiful clinging to the branches and, in NYC, temporarily hiding the grey garbage-covered mounds of ice. 

This morning, instead of being beaten down by yet another snowstorm, I chose to breathe and sit on the porch with a glass of wine and a friend. Well, actually, I chose a snowy, breathtakingly beautiful, five mile run through the serenely quiet Brooklyn park.