Spring in Santiago

A jar of freshly squeezed pineapple juice sits on the table, and around us, the sweet smell of hookah mixes with the springtime air. The sun pours in through the windows, bathing the room in a soft yellow. I’m having a bad Spanish day, so I have to focus on José as he tells me his story. He’s wearing a worn-out gray t-shirt, sweatpants, and his puppy dog pantuflas. I’m not sure what time it is, but it must be early afternoon. Thankfully, there’s no rush to be anywhere other than right here, right now.

The change was gradual: the sun started rising earlier, the trees went into bloom, and the birds picked up their song where they left off in the fall. But at long last, it is spring.

Naturally, I decided I was done with winter weeks ago. When I saw the first flowers of the season, I started walking through the streets of Santiago as if I was Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music. I began congratulating people on surviving the winter, and I refused to wear anything heavier than a hoodie, which meant too many brisk walks to work, hunched over as strangers judged my obviously foreign ways. My spring began by a sheer force of will, and finally, the world seems to have come around to see it my way.

Naturally, my friends thought I was crazy. My roommates told me to go put on “real” pants, and my coworkers dutifully pointed to the calendar hanging on the wall. September 23rd is the Spring Equinox and the official end of winter. No sooner, and no later. I found myself struggling to explain the extent to which I needed this new season to start, with or without the support of reality.

The magic of spring cannot be contained in inked boxes on a calendar. Spring begins with each inhale I take into my lungs just for the simple pleasure of breathing. Spring grows in the deepening hues of pinks and purples that stain the soft skin of the magnolias. And it ends with each petal that falls from the cherry blossom trees on my morning run. Another breath, another flower, another falling. This season is an endless series of beginnings, endings, and the lives that fill in those spaces.

For me, spring isn’t just about the world changing: it is also about changing the way that I see the world. Winter passed by in a blur of grey and monotony. I found my routine, and I walked it every day for months on end. But with spring, I am reminded that my time here is short. Each day, each moment, is a separate experience that begins and ends, and it’s up to me to live it fully. ‘Tis the season for going to the restaurants I always walked by but didn’t have the money or the time to go into. Now is my chance to discover new parks and lounge in the sun with a mote de huesillo in hand. I have paved a path, but this is my last opportunity to break away and find out everything that is waiting in the periphery. Sometimes, that deviation means an impromptu weekend trip out of the city, and at others, it simply means walking down a street I’ve never taken before.

One of the most beautiful tragedies of seasons is the fact that they end. I cannot hold onto spring any more than I can hold onto sunshine. But I can stretch out my hand and feel it as it passes by. In December, I will still say goodbye to Santiago. I don’t have a day picked out or a plan in mind, but some part of me is telling me that it is time to move on to something new. So for the months to come, I will cherish the feeling of shorts on my body and sun on my skin. Spring is a breaking open and bursting out. It is a brown budding green: a life that is starting to be lived again.

My time here is slipping  through my fingers day by day. I have three months, and all I can do now is reach out, make contact, and eventually, let go.