Remember to wander

It’s Saturday morning and I did something I almost never do.

I woke up at six, shuffled to the bathroom, and instead of heading straight to my coffee station like every other morning, my body said, “climb back in.” So I did. I cocooned into my spot – the warm, soft, perfectly shaped version of me that had formed overnight – picked up my phone, and scrolled.

For a full hour.

Now, if you know me, you know I have feelings about phones. I’ve felt the quiet ache of sitting across from someone who couldn’t put theirs down. I’ve watched moms at the beach, heads bent toward a screen while little ones waited to be watched, to be seen. I am not someone who advocates for more screen time, more scrolling, more disappearing into a device.

And yet.

This morning, I smiled at cats doing silly things. I laughed out loud at bloopers from “The Carol Burnett Show” and Johnny Carson. I cried, genuinely cried, at soldier homecomings and videos of men being caught in the act of being extraordinary dads. I felt the full spectrum of emotions, right there in my cocoon, before I ever made my first cup of coffee.

When I finally got up, I sat with the feeling of it. It was the feeling of having just watched a really great movie. Full. Satisfied. Reminded that the world is full of silly and sweet and tender things, if you let yourself look.

The difference, I think, is presence. I wasn’t escaping. I was wandering.

A few weeks ago while journaling, the word wander found me. Not the other way around. I wasn’t looking for it. I was processing a season of hurry-up-and-wait, of unknowns I’d never navigated before, of plans that kept shifting just as I thought I had them figured out. And somewhere in that conversation, I landed here: This is the one that is full of wonder and wander.

I wrote it down. I said it out loud.

This morning, in my cocoon, with my cats probably wondering why I was still in bed, I wandered. Through silly videos and tender moments and the particular joy of Carol Burnett and Tim Conway losing it during a sketch. I wasn’t productive. I wasn’t planning. I wasn’t solving anything.

I was just… there. Wandering around the internet, wondering how people come up with so many creative projects and funny jokes and glad they are sharing them with me.

I’m going to wander out to my kitchen and explore the flavor of the new grind I purchased yesterday. I wonder if it will be good, lol.

What word is finding you this season? I’d love to hear it.

— Tracy