Sophia Mix

I love driving around at night, especially when my sister pulls over to take pictures of the sunset.

I love Michigan. 

Though I fantasize about packing up and moving to some small town in Oregon, Old 28th Street and the simplistic summers spent biking to the farmer’s market I’ve visited since I was two are incomparable.

Fingers sticky from a watermelon-flavored honey stick bought from one of the vendors, I touch my mom’s silky hair and tell her she looks so pretty. 

Liquid sun pours down from the heavens, casting a golden glow onto all the small-town farmers and well-off seniors coming down from whatever high horse they were born on to support them. 

Even in the winter months, I find a reason. 

No matter how much I’ll grow to hate it within the week, there’s something so wistful about waking up to the first silver-blue frost of the year coating every blade of grass in sight, a strip of snow precariously balancing on the tops of the tree branches. 

Sure, December will bring waves of seasonal depression that only supplement the year-round clinical kind, but at least it’s reliable: these waves will force me down to the deepest blues without even the slightest hope of breath, but it’s happened enough that I can narrow down the two weeks where it will be worst; I find a certain comfort in that.

Just as reliably, August brings warm weather and a taste of summer—or at least it used to. I suppose that in recent years, August’s temperatures have been dropping. I hope that at some point, August bliss, painted with colors of maroon and yellow ochre, will return, but that decision is unfortunately not up to me. Instead, it is in the hands of a select group of leaders who don’t seem to understand how irreversible and precious our time is. 

Still, Michigan seems to be saved from it all; beauty persists.

What I mean is, when the scent of lilacs in June carries from my front yard to the back deck where I sit and draw, and April peach blossoms burst, along with my awaiting sketchbook, I’m reminded that my safe haven still stays indeed safe. That the way the headlines put it makes the world seem much more apocalyptic than reality actually teaches. 

Maybe it’s not all bad? Honestly, I’m half trying to convince myself. 

It’s likely that most of the reason I love Michigan so much is because I can call it mine; I’ve never lived anywhere else.

But the vibrant community is undeniable. The opulent crystal chandelier that radiates warmth from the Amway Grand, the smell of the parking garage housing the car of whoever I convinced to take me to Grand Rapids Symphony that night, and the streets, alive with love and joy every Pride. 

If I had to, I’d go to Oregon to be with my family. But a reason to leave my thyme and fresh tomatoes from the farmer’s market behind would be hard to find. I love the sticky 90° summers and the -10° winters that leech the moisture from my skin. I love the overcast sky in November and the cotton candy clouds in July. I love my home and the people in it, and I love the watermelon honey sticks that stuck the summer months of my toddler years together.