I'm not always pruning the hydrangeas and clipping rosemary and simmering garlic until it melts into a paste in the green, golden olive oil. Most days, I spend surrounded by concrete, brick, and blacktop, and the only organic matter that I encounter is the dog shit smeared on the sidewalks and the smell of piss that is always sharp by one particular doorway of an apartment building I walk past every day on the way to the courthouse. Aside from a few scraggly trees and a pit bull that hovers menacingly in a barred window, my daily passeggiata involves hard surfaces and the quickened steps of the harried and little in the way of nature.

When I make the top of the hill that leads from the parking garage to the entrance to the courthouse, there is always a breeze,  even in the rank, moribund days of mid-August. In winter,the wind roars through the canyon of buildings and has almost knocked me off my feet, making me swear and forcing tears out of the corners of my eyes as I try to walk with a scarf across my face without my eyeglasses fogging up. In those moments, I despair of the need to get up every day every day every day and put my feet into shoes and make this walk.  I am grateful for the bursts of air in this weather, it messes my hair but reminds me that there is weather and nature even in the heart of busy, dirty streets filled with people who are struggling much more than I ever have, people who pull carts of groceries and laundry and have three small kids in tow with hoods secured around their faces as they make their way to  the subway or bus stop. Sometime a good, stiff wind scatters your problems like the puffy seeds of dandelions.

When I went into the courthouse yesterday, I took no notice of the weather, so it must have been cool. By the time I emerged hours later, I was surprised by the warm and muggy air that surrounded me. I took off my suit jacket and took out my sunglasses and as I turned my head to look before I crossed the street, the wind hit me unawares and lifted my hair pleasurably.  Underneath the the stickiness was a cold breeze that was the harbinger of  the diminishing days and I felt a relief that in this year of weather extremes and disasters, the earth and sun still perform their intricate dance and the leaves will turn, albeit a few weeks late.

On hot days, freezing days, wet and windy days, I go back to the office melted, battered, blown, and worse for wear. The support staff and managers who don't leave the office all day look at me like a specimen of chaos. They note my wrinkled clothes, the blouse stuck to my back, and the state of my hair, which, my manager says, is my barometer of how stressful my day is. The frizziness of my hair, she says, is directly in proportion to the stress level of my day. I, in turn, crank up the air conditioning, or put on the sweater I keep on my chair, depending on the time of the year, and mutter under my breath how nice it must be to live in a controlled environment, only risking life and limb in the quick dash from the office parking lot into the lobby each morning and out again in the car at the end of the day.

But really, I'd rather dodge the piles of poop and the aggressive panhandler who sometimes commandeers an apartment stoop, calling me bitch when I walk quickly past and refuse to answer him as he calls "hey, can I talk to you, hey". Better to have the wind knock me on my back and turn my umbrella inside out, better to feel the concrete under my feet and feel my hair doubling in size as I drag myself up the last hill than live in a bubble of sharp planes of the desk and the unearthly glow of the computer monitor all day. Better to connect with one face on the street than observe the protocol of averted eyes in the windowless hallways trips between copier and file cabinets. Life is not confined to the weekends,  no matter  how much I dream.