THANKFUL FRIDAY

For many people, today marks the first day of their 21-day gratitude challenge. You may see these challenges posted in memes throughout all the social media formats. It is a daily gratitude practice that leads up to what Americans consider to be the most important day of gratitude, Thanksgiving. It is a lovely way to celebrate the month of November. I believe it also a great way to start a regular habit of daily gratitude. This is not how my gratitude practice began. My practice had nothing to do with Thanksgiving and I had to go to a real dark, woe is me place before realizing I needed a gratitude practice. There was a lot of digging deep in those days and building up of good habits, habits that helped to keep me alive after Chris passed. Some might call those habits life skills, but all of the writing, photography, and the continued quest for joy all started from a simple daily gratitude practice.

I’m not going to lie; the month of October was not an easy one. There was a lot of traveling. There were many tedious and stressful moments. There was illness..or is illness. Michael and I are still coughing and I really have no idea how much more snot I can blow out of my nose. I have an endless supply of mucous right now. But even though October was difficult I can pick out something from each day that made me smile or laugh. Each day there was something I was grateful for. Kleenex. A sunset. Pain au chocolat. Time with a good friend. My gratitude list is long and continues to grow.

Tonight, will be the first Friday in weeks where I’ve slept in my own bed. I will get up tomorrow morning and go about my usual Saturday chore routine, slowly bringing in some normalcy. Michael has been taking care of grocery shopping and laundry and the general household maintenance while I was away. There was a time in our relationship when leaving him to take care of all the things would leave me feeling guilty. There was also a time when Michael was very vocal about being inconvenienced. We’ve both had to do some work to change this way of thinking and behavior. I am grateful that while we might be slow learners, we are learning to work together as a team. I am grateful for Michael’s help during all the chaos of last month. I don’t think that without my gratitude practice, I would have been able to recognize his help in picking up the slack while I was gone.

There’s a lot of good things I wouldn’t notice and would go missing without my gratitude practice. There’s a lot good stuff that I would take for granted. When I remember the person I was before I started the practice, I cringe. Not only was I unhappy, I just didn’t like myself. I’m embarrassed by that past version of me. Sure, I could give dozens of excuses for my unhappiness like finances and living conditions and devastating loss that I just didn’t know how to handle. But my unhappiness leaked out of me and onto others. That feels unforgivable. I felt ugly and recognizing that ugliness, I knew I had to make a change. I could not change my living conditions or too much of my finances. I could not bring back that which was lost. But I could change my mindset. The gratitude practice was the beginning to that change in mindset.

Just something to consider if you’re thinking about starting your own gratitude practice.

AND THEN I DIDN'T SMILE FOR TWO YEARS

Last Thursday, before leaving for my weekend with Heather, I went to the orthodontist to get Invisalign. I thought they would just hand me some plastic teeth covers and that would be it. That is not how this works. First, the technician had to glue a bunch of nubs onto my teeth as well as a metal hook because I have to wear a rubber band on the left side. I was not prepared for any of this. The place where the rubber hooks to the top is poky and has worn a sore into my upper lip. Maybe that will get better when I change them out on Thursday for the next round of teeth covers. Invisalign is basically like making a claymation movie, except instead molding clay, you’re moving teeth. And they’re probably not really called ‘teeth covers’. This is what I have decided to call them because they feel very much like the plastic couch covers of the 70s and 80s.

I hate them.

I keep telling myself that all of this is for the greater good and the health of my mouth. None of this is cosmetic. It’s all about securely setting roots into the jaw bone and maintaining a healthy jaw so that I won’t have to pull all my teeth and get dentures when I’m 80. This is a good and important thing I am doing for my teeth. So many people have told me that I will get used to the teeth covers. They have told me that I will become so well practiced in prying them off my teeth and popping them back on that I won’t need the special hook tool the orthodontist gave me to pry them out. This skill is important because I can’t eat with them in my mouth. There’s no such thing as a spontaneous snack for me anymore. It’s not that I usually snack between meals, but sometimes candy and other goodies are brought into the office. Halloween means that our break room will be filling up with mini-candy bars and skittles. I’m going to have to really want it. Since Michael and I have both been sick, I have not tested out what it’s like to kiss with teeth covers. The orthodontist said to not eat with them in, but did not say anything about leaving them in during sex. It’s either going to be real weird or someone’s new kink. I mean, I’m sure I would not have to search hard to find that porn. I am not going to do that search. This is just where my brain went.

I am growing weary and frustrated with the maintenance of this body. I spent about an hour on hold Monday morning just to leave a message with my intern doctor that I’d like talk about the blood test results from the blood work she ordered two weeks ago. Tuesday, my plan is to make an appointment with my gyno to talk about my ten day periods and the extra one I’m having right now. Maybe it’s just because it’s the week of Halloween, a week of all things gory and spooky. My body wants our costume to be a crime scene or a mash up between Carrie and Slimer (from all the snot coming out of my nose). I know by body is aging, but right now with the teeth covers and the erratic periods, I feel very much like a thirteen year old again.

Aging is living.

MY LACK OF GRATITUDE

I recognize that I’ve missed a number of Thankful Friday entries for the month of October. I also have not slept in my own bed on any Friday night of October. This weekend will be no different. Months ago, Heather got tickets to David Sedaris and then said “Come up for that weekend!” It has been on my calendar since June, well before a planned work trip and an unplanned visit to my mother. To say that the month of October has been a bit packed with travel and feelings is an understatement. I have mentally started compiling a list of things I’m thinking of putting off until next year because I’m loosing interest in doing anything with the rest of the year. I keep saying to people “When things slow down…..” and that really does sound like January to me. I know that in the winter months, there will large swaths of time of nothing because it will be too cold to leave the house.

I also came back from Oklahoma with a nasty head cold that is making it really hard to keep up any kind of momentum. When I texted Heather to warn her about my condition, she replied “Take it easy and we will continue to take it easy through the weekend.” Other than an evening with David Sedaris, we have foot spa plans which requires me to do nothing and I can’t believe how much I am looking forward to doing nothing with Heather. I will admit that returning to a weekly gratitude posting was creeping onto my list of things to be put off until next year. Then I thought about how my weekend to come is something I would normally use for a gratitude post.

I may have only stepped away from this gratitude practice for a brief moment, but I have noticed a shift in my mood and outlook and not it’s not a good shift. How easy it is to slip back into old mindsets of negativity! It is so easy to fall into old ruts and just get stuck following an old path. The good stuff, the moments that make you smile, a lot of times those moments don’t just happen. We have to make moments of joy happen and be open to recognizing hints of those moments when they happen spontaneously. It’s exercise. It’s lifting the five pound weight over and over until suddenly you don’t even notice you’re lifting the five pound weight. I do the work so that eventually I don’t realize I’m doing any work. Joy and gratitude just appears easily. Well…I’m noticing that I need to do the work.

So, I’m grateful for a weekend of rest and time with a friend.

WHAT I BROUGHT BACK

Michael and I drove down to my mom’s Thursday evening, arriving just in time for us all to go to bed. The two of us and Josephine slept on mattresses that had been plopped down in Mom’s living room. I woke up early Friday morning, achy and frozen. We dressed and took Mom out for breakfast. The whole time, Michael and I steered the conversation to the positive and hyping up her big move. Then we went back to her house to load up the vehicles with the things for her new space. This did not take long. Her new space is basically a studio apartment with a tiny living area, a bedroom and bath and a small kitchenette with a small fridge, microwave and sink. We arranged furniture and that was that. Mom is now in her new home.

There were some moments of struggle, things she wanted to take but does not need like her microwave. For the most part, the transition was easy. It did not keep me from worrying about her for the rest of the evening. Michael, my brother and sister-in-law and I went back to my mom’s house to chat and plan the next course of action. I did manage to fill two garbage bags with trash just from clearing and cleaning the kitchen counter, but I quickly ran out of steam. There’s a lot of stuff. A lot of stuff that could be useful to someone. There’s furniture and dishes and pots and pans. I picked up at least five can openers while clearing the counter. There is not a table top surface that is visible from all the piles of knick-knacks and trinkets and just junk. The three of us, me and my siblings, all agree that we need time and space before tackling all of it. This will be how we spend Michael’s Spring Break.

I struggled to sleep that night. Partly because of comfort. Partly because I was so itchy. At some point on Friday, I broke out in hives and have scratched for two days. A big part of my struggle to sleep though was how I couldn’t stop thinking of Mom sleeping in her new space for the first time. Would she feel safe and secure or would she panic and have a restless night, jumping at every new tick or tock sound? The next morning, Michael and I got up early to head back home. I took my mom’s car and a small toy caboose with The Peanut Man emblazoned on the side. I also came home with a mild cough and lots of sinus drainage, which is not an unusual state for me when in Oklahoma, particularly in the Fall. I brought along a slight sense of dread and worry for my mother’s future.

I knew the hoarding situation was bad. I did not realize just how much my mother has declined mentally. I had been told and I had witnessed some of her fogginess, but it didn’t really register. It’s sort of like when the doctors told Chris and I that they found a tumor on his liver. We joked and called it a tortilla chip. It was cancer. Yet to this day, I can’t say that Chris died from cancer. The tortilla chip killed him. I was only seeing my mother’s decline in the times I could get down to visit, which filtered the severity. My sister was seeing and dealing with it daily. I talked to my sister right before we left Mom’s to head back home and she had finally gotten a good night’s sleep. I called my mother on Sunday to check in and she sounded almost like an earlier version of herself. She sounded strong and pleased. She said she had slept through two nights in a row. She’s making friends and I got a picture today of her participating in the day’s group painting project.

I’ve dropped the worry and dread.

I’m keeping the car and the toy caboose.

For now, we are all okay.

MARTHA'S VINEYARD CAMP MEETING ASSOCIATION

It’s easy to catch a ferry to Martha’s Vineyard from Woods Hole. Oak Bluffs has the most flexible ferry schedule. The first time I visited, I rode the ferry to Oak Bluffs, rented a bicycle and immediately cycled over to Edgartown. I didn’t really pay attention to Oak Bluffs, not even when I came back to return the bike and get back on the ferry. This time though, I learned something about Oak Bluffs that I can’t stop dreaming about.

In 1835, some men from the Methodist church in Edgartown purchased a half acre of land for holding religious camp meetings. They built a shed with a pulpit in the front and this was their area of worship. The worshippers attending would set up tents around the pulpit. The first meeting was a success and the tent city started growing. Sometime between 1855 and 1865, there were more family tents and people started to extend their time on the island. Sort of mixing their religious meeting with summer vacations. Eventually a local carpenter was employed to build cottages. At one time there were 500 small family cottages, now there’s about 300, some of them have even been insulated for Massachusetts winters.

Sarah and I walked by almost every single cottage. It’s not hard to do. They’re packed close together and they’re tiny. Yet each one is unique in color, trim and porch displays. I realize now that I never took any pictures of a whole cottage. I focused on the porch displays and the gardens and the neighborhood cat. We stopped in at the gift shop, where we asked all kinds of questions. I wanted to know how many of the cottages still belonged to original families. Only six out of the three hundred are still within original families. There are strict rules to owning a cottage. They don’t allow them to be rented out for more than six weeks a year. You will need three letters of recommendation, one of those from your religious leader, to purchase a cottage. These rules are in place to protect the community feeling of the place.

This was it. This is the kind of place I’m always talking about where all of our friends build our own retirement community, except the houses are already built. The ocean beaches are an easy stroll away, as well as the grocery store and ice cream shops. We could take the largest cottage and have it fitted for a doctor’s clinic for the minor issues of aging and there’s a hospital in Oak Bluffs for bigger issues. We could have amazing trick-or-treat nights for the local children and caroling in December. Our Thanksgiving Table could be set up in the open air tabernacle that sits in the center of the community. Our parties would be epic!

Our community would be joyful.

Community and not taking pictures seems to be a recurring theme around here. But our stroll through this little village inspired more than retirement dreams and the pictures I did take. I thought up a whole story about two girls from different families spending their summers together, riding their bikes out to remote beaches and flirting with lifeguards. They change into different people during their time off the island, but return to being the same old same old every summer. They grow up. They have struggles, but they always come back to the village. It’s their sanctuary, their healing place. There are stories to be told here. Stories of love and loss. Stories of destruction and growth. Stories of finding something worth hanging on to forever. I want to rent one of those cabins for as long as I am allowed and use my time to research and write.

I want to go to camp.

SUNSETS AND NORTHERN LIGHTS

The sunset that evening was spectacular. Sarah called it a “Lisa Frank Sunset” and I don’t think there is a more appropriate description. We witnessed the electric pinks of the setting sun from the deck of the ferry as we traveled back to Woods Hole from Martha’s Vineyard. It was so cold and windy that I would have to take breaks, ducking inside to warm up before jumping back out into the wind for more pictures. This moment and then on our last morning when we stopped at the beach so I could get lighthouse pictures are two moments of joy on my timeline map, stuck in with thumbtacks. Both times, my camera was in my hands and up to my face and I was snapping away.

The night of the Lisa Frank Sunset, I got restless and walked outside. I looked up at the sky and could see brushstrokes of pink still lingering in the clouds. I thought it was leftover sunset and since I wasn’t really in a good spot for taking pictures, I didn’t bother. When I finally went back inside, I sat on my bed scrolling through Instagram. Chad shared an image of the Northern Lights taken by a friend and it suddenly hit me. I texted Chad to ask where his friend was and he quickly sent back an answer. His friend had taken the picture in Massachusetts. I hadn’t witnessed lingering sunset. I had been staring up at the Northern Lights the whole time and didn’t even know it.

And I didn’t take any pictures.

Months ago, when I dragged Michael out to Smithville lake to see the Northern Lights, the only way we could see them was through the camera lens. We saw nothing with our naked eyes. This is why I am not sad about not capturing any images from last Thursday’s solar flare event. Seeing the Northern Lights with my eyes is something I never thought I’d get to see or experience. So often, when we think of things we can’t imagine living through or experiencing, they are the negative life experiences. “I can’t imagine…” “I could never…” I don’t know how anyone could….” All of those sentences end in a description of destruction and loss. What if I started flipping this narrative? Not just flipping it, but making it happen?

I can’t imagine ever seeing the Northern Lights. Check

I can’t imagine eating a baguette while gazing up at the Eiffel Tower.

I can’t imagine ever having the kitchen of my dreams.

I can’t imagine watching the sunset over the Grand Canyon. Check

I can’t imagine going to Ireland with my mother. Check

I can’t imagine doing anything more than just taking the picture. Check

I can’t imagine ever seeing a moose.

I can’t imagine checking off everything from my list because my list will just keep growing. In the meantime, I will place another thumbtack in my mental timeline and start linking all the other thumbtacks together with string. Then I can pluck the strings and let the memories vibrate through my soul.

A CHANGE IN THE TIMELINE

The timeline for moving my mother to assisted living has been moved up. My sister is desperate to put my mom someplace where she’ll be too distracted with elderly activities to do dangerous activities. I guess there was an incident a week or so ago where my sister caught our mother standing on the kitchen cabinets, vacuuming the top cabinets. This gives me a real glimpse at my own future and the old lady that I will be because my first instinct was to shrug and say “good for her!” I had to pause and think about why this might actually be a bad or dangerous activity for my eighty three year old mother who has been prone to falls. My mom is bored. She needs stuff to do, preferably stuff that doesn’t involve electric hedge trimmers or climbing the walls.

I have to admit that I straight up panicked when my sister sent me the text that she was trying to get Mom moved by the end of October. Between work and Michael’s school schedule, October is FULL and I don’t know how I’m going to get down there to help out. My sister is all ‘you don’t need to help unless you want to help’ and I of course don’t want to help but I don’t want her to have to do this alone. I am also struggling to find an estate liquidation company that a. works in the area b. will handle smaller houses and c. call me the fuck back! I do not want to be cleaning out the same stuff I’ve already cleaned out once in the middle of winter. Or any time really. To make matters worse, any time anyone asks me how I feel about moving my mom into assisted living, I start crying. I can’t talk about it. Thursday, after my sister’s text, I got on my yoga mat and started sobbing in child’s pose. No one had asked me anything. I was just doing my practice while sobbing uncontrollably.

Nothing to see here.

I think the reason I can’t talk about my feelings on this subject is because they’re so complicated. I truly believe that the assisted living home is going to be wonderful for my mother. She will have people her own age to talk with (or at), tons of activities available to her and outside gardens to wander. She will have a community, something she hasn’t had since leaving Collinsville. On the other hand, I am worried that my mother will isolate herself and find excuses and or complaints for not joining in with her new community. I can only imagine that the feelings are similar when sending a child to their first day of school. Will they make friends? Will they be liked by others? Will they be sad the whole time? These are all the things I worry about with my mother.

Then there’s anger.

Honestly, I’ve been angry with my mother since 2013 for a number of reasons, one of them being not listening to some sound wisdom from her children to not rush to sell the old house. But she refused, was adamant that this had to happen RIGHT NOW! At the end of the day, she did what she wanted without considering the consequences or her own future. She purposefully isolated herself and she didn’t take care of her body. It’s like she gave up on life without having the gumption or follow through to truly give up on her life. Instead she takes out her frustrations of still being around on her children. We are the ones that have to sit and listen to all the ways she is unhappy, disappointed and unsatisfied. We are well aware that her unhappiness, disappointments and unsatisfaction began well before any of us were born, that we are just part of the long line of it since her birth. Knowing this does not make listening to it all any easier.

I let go of the idea and feelings that I am part of my mother’s long list of disappointments some time ago, mostly because I have no control over it. I’m not angry at being one of her many sources of unhappiness. I am angry that she never took responsibility for her own happiness. I am angry at her choice to take her life lemons and turn them into just straight up lemon juice, refusing to add sugar for a nice refreshing drink. Instead she has just marinated herself in that bitter lemon juice and I am angry at her refusal to take responsibility for her own actions and choices. And this lemon juiced soaked woman is who we are moving to assisted living. My sister confessed that she’s been having nightmares about our mother getting kicked out of the facility and I couldn’t assuage her concerns.

That’s a valid nightmare.

I suppose my tears come from worry that my mother will not be able to take advantage of her new home and will not find joy in the company of new friends. I worry that she will park herself in a chair in her room and never venture out of her room, not even trying. This thought along with no longer having a home to go back to in Oklahoma are the things that send me over the edge. My touch stone is broken and unrepairable and my mother is sitting in a room choosing misery. And the estate liquidation company will not call me back which means that we will have to deal with the contents of our mother’s house on our own.

For most of my life I have felt unprepared or trained for the task of adulting. I didn’t know how to go about buying a house or even saving money properly. There are adult things I purposefully avoided because I knew I was ill-equipped, like motherhood. I just straight up avoided the things I knew for sure no one had even bothered to mention to me, let alone teach me how to deal with. All right, there were some tasks I had to deal with because they were unavoidable. Bodies don’t cremate themselves. While I was making it up as I go, I did manage to do those very hard adult tasks. I didn’t say I was not capable. I am untrained to deal with the aging parent side of adulting.

But I’m dealing.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Last Saturday, the Cabbage had piano lessons at 11:30. Her teacher holds lessons on the second floor of one the old warehouses in the historic West Bottoms. Sometimes I tag along, sometimes I’m busy doing other things. Usually, Michael and I wander around some of the antique shops in the area while the Cabbage is having their lesson. Then we’ll go have lunch somewhere after lessons. On this particular Saturday, I took my camera with me thinking I’d be inspired by the old, rundown buildings in the West Bottoms.

I’ve done this before, taken my camera along when visiting this area of the city. What has happened more often than not is that I don’t ever really take any pictures. I get distracted poking around a shop or Michael suggests getting hot beverages and then I’m holding a coffee and trying to wield my camera at the same time. It seemed like that same sort of thing was going to happen last Saturday too. I took a few snaps, drank a macchiato and then wandered around a shop that mostly sells houseplants. But something changed after lunch. We ended up at an old deli in downtown where the Cabbage ordered a slice of cheese pizza with extra cheese and a side of cottage cheese and Michael and I had a discussion about how badly we did or did not need to go to Costco. It was decided that need was not great and our time would be better spent wandering around the downtown public library.

The Kansas City Downtown Public Library is often on a must-see list. The parking garage is painted on one side to look like a giant bookshelf of books. The library itself is housed in an old bank, the vault is visible on basement level where the film and music section is housed. That floor also contains a display of Orval Hixon’s photos, including the one I shared here earlier this week. Every floor holds a treasure other than books and every floor has a window (or three or twenty) that provides an interesting view of the downtown skyline. And I had my camera out for all of it. I took my time, often letting Michael and the Cabbage get way ahead of me, often just wandering off from the group that was us. It was the most time I had spent consciously taking photos with my Nikon since maybe our trip to New Orleans back in March.

It made me breathe out in a sigh of relief.

This has been a very good week. Three days this week, I have ridden my bicycle to work. Michael installed a new and improved basket onto Valerie. My old Ikea one broke in a most annoyingly spectacular way last week. There has been time for my yoga practice and I made an edible loaf of sourdough bread over the weekend that was good enough to soak in the Sunday’s pot of beans and greens. I got us tickets to an event hosted by The Friends of Library this evening where we will picnic in Union Hill Cemetery and listen to ghost stories from some voice actor. When we still were not eating in restaurants because of the pandemic, Michael and I grabbed food to go from an area restaurant and had a picnic in this cemetery and it was one of my favorite things we did during the pandemic or ever. So I’m ending the week doing one my most favorite things.

This is week has been a reprieve from the chaos of my October Calendar, a moment of peace before I start running around like chicken for the next three weeks. I’m grateful for this calm before the storm.

ORVAL HIXON'S SISTER AND FRIENDS

Cleo is Orval’s sister. She’s the one in the back on the left, wearing the sailor collar. The little boat is her’s and the other ladies in the boat are labelled as her ‘friends’. After a brief poke-around on the interwebs, I realized that this was all the information I would find on this photo. Cleo’s older brother, Orval Hixon was a prominent photographer, specializing in vaudeville portraits, including a very young and topless Joan Crawford. There’s really not that much information out there about Orval either other than a few articles on his contribution to the art world in the Mid-west.

Everything else, the names of the other women, their relationship, all of it is left up to my imagination.

I could tell the stories of each of these young ladies.

I know by just the look on the those young faces what kind of girls they are. Cleo is just barely part of the gang, clinging desperately to the edge. She will do anything they ask of her and will employ any and all tactics just to be included. Cleo knows that the young woman, I’ll call her Agnes, in the very front is infatuated with her older brother and all she had to say at the end of her invites was “Orval will be there. He’s bringing his camera. Please come.” Agnes will be the one to persuade the others; her family is among the wealthy and elite. They vacation in Europe every March. Everyone listens to Agnes because she is the ‘it’ girl. Her sister, Agatha sitting behind her, has little choice in the matter. A year younger than Agnes, Agatha would rather be at home playing her piano, but instead is always Agnes’s chaperone. Betty, the young lady sitting next to Cleo is actually Cleo’s best friend. They have known each other the longest, spent nights on sleeping porches tracing the stars and telling secrets. Betty does not understand Cleo’s obsession with this gang of women, a gang we would label as the cool girls today, but Betty understands Cleo’s desire to be liked. Don’t we all want to be liked?

Now the young lady with the tie, that’s Penelope though everyone calls her PenPen or Penny. Both nicknames cause Penelope to roll her eyes and mumble something under her breath about not being a child. Penelope is sitting in that boat because her social climbing mother practically shoved her out the door when Agnes and Agatha stopped by for tea with their mother. Agnes opened her mouth about Cleo’s little boating excursion, leaving out the part that Orval would be there with his camera. Agnes’s mother thought this sounded like a perfectly wholesome activity; she felt Cleo was a little beneath them socially, but seemed very pious. Agnes’s mother hoped that some of her piety might rub off on her daughters. Agnes knew how her mother felt about piety and Cleo and invitations from Cleo were used often by Agnes even when there was no invitation from Cleo. Agnes made her invitation to Penelope to join them sound perfunctory and expected out of kindness. Agnes was not ever going to admit this, she thought Penelope was the prettiest girl in their class. She was also very cool, not caring what anyone may say about her. Agnes was happy to invite Penelope along. She suspected that Penelope smoked cigarettes and nicked bottles of wine. Agnes wanted to be a bad girl, but lacked the bravery required to do anything on her own. So, she latched on to people who would do the bad things for her.

Penelope didn’t do any of those things except the not caring part. As far as she was concerned she was just biding her time until graduation. Her father had mentioned the possibility of sending Penelope to a girls’ college. Now Penelope would have been happier if he had left out the ‘girls’ part, but college was college. Her escape. Her freedom, or as much freedom as a young woman could expect in 1918. Penelope wanted to be a journalist and travel the world telling the stories of war torn nations and the every day struggles of the poor. She wanted action and adventure and purpose. This is why her gaze at the camera is one of boredom. Penelope is bored with the whole affair, but most particularly with Orval himself. What a waste of a man and talent. All he wanted was to stay here and take portraits of vaudeville starlets. Penelope wondered if she could get him to teach her some basic photography. Then thought better of it. She doubted she could tolerate his postering and egotistical manner, which she was sure he would have. She also didn’t doubt that he would easily construe their lesson as something else and Penelope would spend the whole time avoiding grabs and pinches.

Penelope has a story that will reach beyond the usual dutiful housewife.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

I had some time to kill between appointments on Thursday, so I walked over to a little coffee shop to grab a coffee. At the last minute I asked for a pain au chocolat. I gathered my coffee and treat and settled in at table with a view of the door. The place wasn’t busy at first, then a stream of people started to pour in. I sat there with my coffee and croissant, just people watching. A young woman sat at a table near me, her back turned from me. A few minutes later a young man walked by and stopped to ask her if her avocado toast was any good. She replied that it was and he moved on to settle at his own table.

I watched a woman secure the leash of her little dog to a table outside and then go in. The little dog watched and waited for her return. I watched as people left, passing the dog without a notice. How can you just walk by and not even say “hello puppy!”? A few runners were still out on their morning runs, probably near the end of their run. I wondered what all these people could possibly be doing. It was 9:00 AM on a Thursday. Where did these people work? I’m sure some were students, some retired. It’s possible that some were headed to work in one of the shops in the area that didn’t open until 10:00. Possibly some of the people getting coffee were actual tourists. I recognized some typical touristy clothings, new Kansas City t-shirts.

I sat there speculating about the lives of these people, but they could easily have the same speculations about me sitting in a cafe late on a Thursday morning. I myself am like a tourist without doing all the touristy things. Alone, in a cafe on a weekday morning with minimal commitments and even those are commitments only for myself, feels decadent. A treat. A treat that should not be this rare. A treat that shouldn’t be a treat. It is moments like this that leave me asking why do I put off doing things like this. I get a personal day every year and it sits there lingering while I use up vacation days or sick days. I’m even sparing with my vacation and sick days, saving up for I don’t know what. Later in the day, I cried on the massage table while the therapist pressed out tiny knots between my back ribs. She spent so much time on my shoulders that she left little time for the rest of my body. My upper back feels like it’s been beaten with a ball peen hammer today, my punishment for not taking care of myself sooner.

I’m trying real hard to focus only on the things I can control. I am trying real hard to tuck in moments of joy, to do more dancing, to leave space for being silly. Today, I am grateful for the moments this week when I remembered to leave space for the joy, the dancing and the silliness.

SOURED

The first quote in my new Saturday morning journal is something from Amelia Earhart and because Michael left multiple pages between the quotes, I have spent multiple Saturdays on the same story. The story that came forth was one of a woman trying to make a loaf of bread from a sourdough starter she had also created. So, it’s an autobiographical tale. I had left off the previous Saturday with the woman, Amber, eyeing her sourdough starter with suspicion. When I picked up the thread from there, I wrote about coming from a family that didn’t bake loaves of bread. This is true. We baked cakes, cookies and pies. Cornbread and biscuits. Rolls for Thanksgiving dinner. Never loaves of bread. I was raised in the west by people raised in the south. The leavening agent of choice was baking powder or backing soda and yeast sold in tiny square packets. Sourdough was something someone made in the north, on a coast.

I am not genetically predisposed for baking a loaf of sourdough bread.

Yet…I keep trying, tossing my failed attempts into the garbage each week.

As I tossed the latest failed attempt, Michael told me for the thousandth time about how he used to make really good bread. He worked at Subway and Planet Sub in his late teens, early twenties. So he knows how to make corporate bread for the masses. Then he asked if I just wanted him to make me a loaf bread, obviously oblivious and clueless about my motivations for my own attempts at making a loaf of bread. The truth is, I could also make a really good loaf of bread using the very same method Michael would probably use. I too have done this thousands of times. What I have not done, is create a loaf of sourdough bread with a crispy outside and a light, airy inside. I have not produced anything I want to slather with butter and jam or smashed avocado. Not ever. Not with the old starter and for sure not with this new one.

But it doesn’t keep me from trying.

Michael keeps asking me what he can do to help with the things I’ve been worrying about. “What would be easier for you?” is his go-to question. The answer I never give him, the truth, is that what would be easier is not have to answer the question at all. Just step in and take some action. He still hasn’t learned that while I am a very independent woman, it sure is nice to have someone else just step in and do something without having to be asked or told. You see it needs to be done, so you do it. But in all fairness, there is nothing I can do to fix or change or make things easier for myself either. I just have to accept the process and give in to the knowledge that there is nothing I can do.

All this time, while making my sourdough bread, I have meticulously weighed flour and water. I have had complete control over the ingredients, yet no control over the outcome of mixing those things together. And that’s the lesson. Each batch of bread is a reminder that there are only parts of a situation that you have control over. The moment I place the dough into the oven, I loose all control over what kind of loaf of bread it’s going to turn out to be. I just have to wait and see. If it fails, it fails and I just try again maybe with a different recipe or doing more to adjust the temperature of the house to accommodate a better rise. The important part is that I try again. And again. And again. And again. With each attempt, leaning into the unknown, knowing that I made an effort. I carefully weighed and measured.

All that’s left is the wait and see part.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Tuesday, we had a blood drive at work and when I went to sign in, they looked at my blood type and basically said I had good juice and asked if they could take extra. I shrugged while saying “sure” and they hooked me up to a machine named Alex. I squeezed a squishy heart for about forty minutes until the machine malfunctioned and the nurse declared that I had done enough. I said “Great!” and hopped off the table, grabbed a Sprite and bag of Veggie Wheat Crackers (I love these!) and went back to my desk. About an hour later, I went to meet my new intern. I was sitting in my exam room and decided that I no longer needed my bandage from the blood drive, so I ripped it off. Then I started bleeding. My new intern came into the exam room while I was rummaging around through drawers looking for a bandaid. I said “I’m not a junky. I need a bandaid.” New intern hesitantly said ‘okay’ before handing over a bandaid.

Everything was fine after that. She said absolutely nothing about the scale numbers, but did mention that her mother found some drug helpful with relieving hot flashes. Meaning, I am probably close to the same age as her mom. My new intern could have been my kid. Awesome. She talked me into getting my flu shot and then said we’d talk after I got blood work done next week. Then she started checking for swollen ankles starting with the right one and when she moved to the left one, I said “Yeah…that’s going to be swollen.” Then I told her what I did. She was only concerned about how I was managing the pain. I told her I’ve been managing with ice and grit teeth. She did not think I was hilarious. It was the weirdest meet-and-greet, but she didn’t sound like she had plans to drastically change what’s already working.

The ankle feels mostly better and I have started walking Josephine in the mornings again. The strange thing is that when I fell, the plantar fasciitis pain in the right foot, completely disappeared. Now that the left foot is healing, the pain in the right heel is back. My body has decided that I can only have one injured foot at a time. That is very generous. Meanwhile, I found a shirt that perfectly describes me and I ordered it through Amazon. It’s basically a bloody, dirty t-shirt with I’m Fine printed across the chest. For one whole day, when you asked Alexa about our notifications she would say things like “your bloody shirt will arrive today” or “your bloody shirt has been delivered.” And all of that makes up for the fact that the shirt is a little smaller than I’d hoped for. Michael said we need a Halloween party to attend and I said “whatever. I’m wearing this to work on Friday.” This is not a Halloween shirt, but an any occasion T.

I’m meeting Nurse Jenn for lunch today at the Nelson so we can get a sneak peak at the new Hokusai: Waves of Inspiration exhibit and then we’ll eat fancy lunch in the Roselle Court. It just dawned on me that this sounds like a retired ladies activity and if this is what my retired self is going to be actively doing, I’m ready for it. I’m all in. More of this please. It was recommended (Amani) that I need to have some me time. Lunch with Nurse Jenn is part of that. Next week, I have a dentist appointment followed by a chiropractor appointment and I decided that this was a great time to use my personal day. I went ahead and booked a massage for that afternoon.

Now I recognize that booking a massage is only a small step in the right direction, that I need to carve out time everyday just to care for myself. I am working on this. I am getting myself organized and putting me (not events) onto my calendar. And then sticking to that calendar. Follow through is sometimes not my strong suit when the subject is me. There’s also a tiny bit of me that thinks I shouldn’t bother with me until next year. This year is practically over. Make a resolution. Do better in 2025. Then I slap myself like Cher does to Nicolas Cage in Moonstruck. Time is relative! The concept of years is a social construct of organization. What I really mean to say is that I am working on getting myself out of this current glitch mode. The first step is admitting when you are in glitch mode, not just mentally inside your own head. For me, typing it out for my whole community to see is a huge motivator for getting myself together. Because I don’t want you to know that I am in glitch mode. I want to be able to share a better version of myself.

This week, I am very grateful to have a community who makes me feel safe enough to share glitch moments. I am grateful for a community that roots or each other.

I'M FINE

Last Thursday, I was in the middle of my morning walk with Josephine when I stepped and then rolled on a walnut ball. I twisted my left ankle and fell hard onto the sidewalk, scraping my knee and the palms of my hands. I laid there for a few minutes wondering if I was dead or just broken. Then I carefully peeled my body from the ground and hobbled home. And I treated the day like any other day despite having an ankle the size of a grapefruit and a bloody knee. I went to my chiropractor and literally said to her “I do not have time to take care of my body right now. Pop things together and let’s go.” RICE doesn’t work for someone who finds it impossible to be still.

Now, I have been sitting a lot with my foot propped up. In the evenings, I have been sitting with an ice pack draped over my ankle. I also have not taken Josephine on a morning walk since last Thursday. I am sitting at my desk now and stressing about the number of steps I am not getting today. I hardly ever sit at my desk. I’m mostly always standing because sitting is the new poison. I have an appointment this week for my yearly cholesterol checkup and my doctor is a new intern. I get a new one every two years, but this one didn’t want to authorize blood work before we meet. So I guess we’ll talk about my weight and my sporadic exercise routine. I can show her the lovely shades of purple and blue surrounding my left ankle. I can talk to my doctor about how I’m really trying to incorporate exercise into my daily life even though I’d really like to be taking a nap.

I kind of feel little bit like Artax stuck in the Swamp of Sadness.

About a month ago, I started my own sourdough starter. I had let my old one rot and die in the fridge and since I had already replaced it twice by asking my work friend for some of his, I didn’t feel like I could ask again. Also, I thought that by making my own starter, I might be more vested in taking care of it. Olga. I’ve named her Olga and she looks bubbly and smells ripe. I think it’s working but I have spent the last two weekends testing it out by trying to make a loaf of bread. Both experiments have produced hard dense, discus like structures that are very wet on the inside. To be fair, I never really made a spectacular loaf of bread with the old starter. It was mostly used to make spectacular pizza crust and maybe that’s how I should be testing out Olga. But I just want to get a loaf bread right. This feels like something I should be good at. Wait…this is something I used to be good at. The number of loaves of wheat bread I baked during my 4-H years was equivalent to a bakery and the bread was good. We liked eating the bread. All I can do now is produce lumps of dense dough very similar to the shape of my body.

Lump of my lump.

I get that I have a lot of mental space and energy being spent on other things right now. I have a day job that requires brain power and problem solving. I’m teaching a four week yoga session on building up a strong and healthy plank pose. I’m still teaching chair yoga once a week. I am always thinking about a current family situation and ‘always thinking’ really should translate to ‘always worrying’. Things will settle and be easier…next week…next month…next year. This is what I keep telling myself. I will be able to commit to my own body once some other things are settled. Once I’ve healed.

Or once I’ve made a decent loaf of sourdough bread.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

When Chris and I moved into our house, it came with a large brush pile in the back corner of our backyard. After Chris died, I decided I was going to garden and put in some raised beds. Then I built a compost bin from wood pallets. Don’t ever do that, by the way. It was a terrible compost bin and eventually the wood pallets started to fall apart and collapsed in on each other. The brush pile from the corner got moved next to and into the compost bin. My gardening attempts were unsatisfying and I abandoned the beds. Eventually I broke them down and evened out the yard where they had been sitting, with the exception of one spot. It looks like we buried a body there. Meanwhile, the brush pile continued to grow. Michael and I built the firepit with the intention of burning off the brush pile and sometimes it looked like we were actually going to do that. The pile would dwindle a bit, but a tree limb would fall or we’d clear off the fence line and the pile would just grow.

Recently, over the summer, Michael and I cleaned out the garage and piled all the unwanted big trash items into the backyard. That pile has been sitting there mocking me for weeks. Every time Michael and I had the discussion about what to do with it all, the discussion would just be a great big circle of words without actions. It was too little to fill up a Bagster dumpster, but too big for regular garbage. So now, every time I looked into the backyard I saw two large piles of garbage and hate would fill up inside my heart. Finally we just decided to see how much garbage we could put into the back of Michael’s truck and pay to dump it someplace. Turns out, you can put a lot of garbage in the back of Michael’s truck and for fifty dollars, a place not far from us will let you throw it all into a compacter hole. I don’t know what this says about my life, but throwing stuff into that hole is the most fun I’ve had in a really long time.

After throwing away the big garbage, we came home and started burning up the brush pile. And for the first time since ever, when I look out into my backyard there is not a pile of brush or garbage out there making me scowl. We burned up all of the brush plus a pile of brush from our next door neighbor. If we want to have another firepit night, we will have to buy wood to burn. There’s nothing left to burn. This makes me want to twirl around with my arms open wide while singing The Sound of Music. I can see the potential of a backyard that is inviting and lovely to sit in, a place were we could entertain friends and just relax. Maybe we’ll eventually build a patio and buy real patio furniture and a grill that didn’t come to us free from Facebook market place.

At some point during our firepit night, I could see that this was going to be it for that brush pile and I was giddy. Michael said something like “So getting rid of stuff brings you joy, huh?” and it does. It is beyond pleasing to me. I love throwing things away. Sometimes a little too much. I threw away my power cord for an external harddrive during one cleaning frenzy. I do not believe I threw out Michael’s passports (yes, multiple) even though he has torn the house apart looking for them. I do think they are probably in the garbage, but I was not the one who put them there. But still…it could have been me. I just don’t see a need to hang onto a lamp that broke two years ago and is hanging out in the basement waiting to be repaired. I’m not going to repair a lamp. I am also not going to have a garage sale. Garage sales are their own special kind of Hell and I want no part in it. I don’t have the mental or physical energy for that. Park a dumpster in my driveway and I could cart stuff out to it all day.

It is a little disturbing how the act of throwing things in a dumpster can make me so gleeful. Maybe disturbing is not the right word choice. I’ve lived amongst the hoarding type my whole life and it has given me a great appreciation for less. I think there’s a bout of Swedish Death Cleaning in my future. I think this would be a great uplifting activity for those winter months when I have the winter blues. Today, I am grateful for the view from my kitchen window into the backyard and how it is no longer marred with a giant pile garbage.

THE LITTLE FORTUNE COOKIE BOOK

Saturday morning, I climbed on to my usual chair at the counter in Heirloom and opened the Fortune Cookie journal to the very last page. Then I proceeded to write my very last tiny story based off of a fortune. By the time I had filled the page, I had emptied my plate and I sat there looking from the empty plate to full page and back. Empty plate. Full page. Full book. I put the date at the top of the page so I would have a record of when I finished. I did not think to put a starting date at the beginning. I had to go searching through my old photos to find the start date. September 29th, 2015. For nine years, I have been taking a Saturday here and there and writing a story based on a prompt from a fortune cookie.

Nine years.

I closed the little journal and walked out to my car and immediately started sobbing. Heck, I just started crying while typing this. When Michael asked me how I felt about it, I told him that I couldn’t talk about it. Now, I’m not even sure I can write about it. First of all….NINE FUCKING YEARS! I can’t believe that I have been doing this for that long. Sure the practice was inconsistent. I only wrote in the journal on the Saturday mornings I was alone and taking care of the grocery shopping. There were long stretches of summer months when this didn’t happen or weekends when I was out of town. There were limits to my writing ritual. I almost treated the ritual like I do a really good chocolate bar, eating one square at time savoring the rich chocolate for days. It’s almost as if I anticipated the ending before even beginning.

I completed a journal of incomplete stories.

Well…of course I did. That’s my modus operandi. My Google Docs folder is filled with stories yet to be finished. I am nothing but stories yet to be finished and to finish anything at all feels momentous. I thought I was on the verge of turning into Chris with a stock pile of journals each containing a sentence or list here or there, never filling one up. When Michael placed that little journal into my Christmas stocking all those years ago, he had no idea it would grow into a thing or a thing I might even finish. He started looking for a replacement journal and then started to panic because he knew I was reaching the end of this journal and he had yet to find a worthy replacement. I had four pages left in the Fortune Cookie journal and in haste, he bought a blank notebook and then carefully wrote down various well known quotes on every other page. This notebook is bigger with wide spacing, room for a story to grow. It is probably the most thoughtful gift he has ever given me.

On Saturday morning, I will climb up into the chair in what I now consider to be my spot at the counter at Heirloom. I will open a brand new journal and I will weave together a new story.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

I feel like it has been over a year since one of our graduate students gave me a Brazilian wish ribbon with instructions to tie it onto my Vespa. The ribbon (and wish) is tied with three knots around a wrist. The wish is said to come true once the ribbon falls off on it’s own accord. I tried looking back through old pictures to see if I could determine when I placed this ribbon on Valarie and found a picture of it on Valarie back in November 2022. One side of the ribbon was already a bit frayed. So, it has been more like two years since I made a wish and tied my ribbon to Valerie.

I don’t remember what I wished for, but I feel certain that the wish wasn’t something entirely for myself. Wishing on birthday candles or stars, it doesn’t matter. I never seem to be able to come up with a wish for myself. I make my wishes for things I have no control over. World peace. Affordable healthcare for all. Body autonomy. I wish for all young women the rights to make choices for their own bodies. I wish for the US to stop providing weapons to Israel and aiding in genocide. My wishes are complicated things that I want for this planet, my community, my immediate circle of loved humans. They are not always complicated. I often make a wish for friend in their times of struggle and need. Some would say that my wishes are prayers. I might say that prayers are often wishes.

I have read too many stories about wishes for me to feel comfortable wishing for something just for myself. There are so many cautionary fables of wishing for money and the person making the wish receives a fortune but it’s because a loved one died, leaving behind an inheritance. Someone may wish to be famous and then they become so famous, they have zero privacy. A person may wish for the return of a loved one and wake up next to a corpse. Selfish wishes come with a price. These are the fables we have used to condition us into thinking that we cannot ask for something we want, especially if you are a woman. I have heard it so many times all the ways in which I can’t have it all. I wouldn’t even know how to start a wish for myself.

I was helping that graduate student troubleshoot some problems with their lab’s microscope this week. They have graduated and will be moving on to their Postdoc position in California. While I was crawling around under the microscope table, they said “Hold on. I have something for you.” Then they came back with three new wish ribbons. I had mentioned to them months ago that mine was getting frayed and I hated to loose it, even though I know that’s point. They told me that they found the ribbons while cleaning out, preparing for their move. This is one of the things I do not like about my job. I watch these young people come in, help train them, watch them get excited about science and microscopy. I get attached. Then they graduate or their postdoc time is up and they are off to build their scientific careers. I hate seeing some of them go, but also proud because I know they’re going to be successful.

So now I have three new wishes that I can make.

I know two of those wishes will go towards better things for my community and world, like an education free from violence and fear for our children and the end of genocide. The third wish is one I’m saving for myself. If it was not for the job I do, I would not have ever met this graduate student or have learned about wish ribbons. My path has led me to a diverse crowd of interesting and wonderful people and not just at work. My life is filled with color and light and texture. If I have one wish for myself it would be for more. More color and light and texture. More love. More of the good stuff.

More gratitude for that good stuff.

ROASTED VEGETABLES

This isn't a recipe post. I just didn’t really know how to title this one. Depending on your general philosophy, the title can express negative and positive feelings. Are you a glass half full kind of person? Then you might find this post to be mildly pleasant. Who knows? And since I will not be advertising this one in my Facebook timeline, very few of you will end up reading any of it any way. I guess I could have titled this “The Things I’m Not Prepared For” but that’s such a big list of things. Or it’s a short list.

Things I’m not prepared for: everything.

We are preparing for my mother to go to assisted living. Now, I have been a huge advocate for assisted living. In fact, I urged my mother to consider moving into a retirement village when she sold the old house. Unfortunately, retirement communities had already taken up negative mental space in my mother’s brain and she flat out refused. Instead she bought the house next door to my sister, which further isolated her from her usual activities. Bit by bit, since moving into that space, my mother has become less active. We are now at the point where she doesn’t leave her house unless my sister takes her somewhere and the toll it is taking on her mental and physical well being is very obvious. Her doctor recommends we make the move by December.

I want to believe that my mother’s mental health is going to drastically improve once she is in her new little studio apartment. It is the time between now and when she is actually settled is the part that is making my stomach hurt. My mother took almost everything from the old house. Boxes of things I know I personally put into the dumpster while cleaning out the old home will randomly appear when I arrive for a visit. “Oh I found this stuff of yours. Do you want it?” I have stopped arguing or trying to make sense of it. Instead I enthusiastically say “yes!” while putting the box in my car. Then I drive it away and dispose of it properly, saying goodbye once again to things from my past. And I honestly do not think I have the energy to do this for a whole house again.

Every time I have visited my mother this year, she has been almost frantic with what she was going to do with all of these things. My sister and I have both told her that she only needs to think about the stuff she’s taking to the new place. A love seat. A full size bed. A dresser and nightstand. Clothes. She won’t need fifty bath towels or twenty sheet sets. She won’t need her pots and pans even. My sister and I both have told her this and that we will find someone to help us take care of the contents of what’s left. I have a number for an estate sale company, but these are all things we can not do until my mother is settled in her new space. We are at this uncomfortable holding pattern.

I was not prepared my mother to age so quickly. I was not prepared for her confusion or how soft her body feels now. I was not prepared for the boulder of guilt that I am now carrying around with me because I feel like I am not doing enough or I’m using my distance as an excuse to not do more. Some of that guilt boulder is made from apathy. I just don’t care about all of the stuff in my mother’s house. I don’t value it the way she does. I have never valued the things as much she does. This has always led to contention. She sees it all as her memories and I am inconsiderate for not placing the same values on these memories as she does. I will be taking her car and I feel guilty for that even though I have the blessing from both siblings. I don’t like asking for things, even when it will make my life easier.

Today, while trying to figure out a visit for Thanksgiving, I was looking at Airbnbs and it just felt so expensive. This is when it hit me. I no longer have a home in Tulsa, at least not one that accommodates all of us, Michael, the Cabbage and Josephine. I know I am always welcome at my brother’s. They have a spare bedroom or at least I think they do. But all four of us visiting is cramped and I hate doing that my brother. And all of these feelings and anxieties have been festering inside of me for weeks now. I don’t dare write about it all because my mother doesn’t react well to anything I’ve written about her in this space. I’ve been considerate of her feelings for oh so long, but I’m filled up to the max. I’m not sharing this to Facebook with the idea that this is the only way she knows how to get here.

The things I wasn’t prepared for was the hard stuff. Yet every time I am presented with the impossible, I have moved forward in some way….hopefully healthy. I may not be prepared for it, but I seem to be pretty good at improvising. Macguyvering my way through life, one sheet pan full of roasted veggies at a time.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Early in the week, Talaura asked if she could come to my house for a rest stop as she drove from Oklahoma to Pennsylvania. She’s been in Oklahoma, sorting and packing up her parent’s home so that it can be sold. It has been grueling work and during the hottest time of the year. She arrived late Wednesday evening with Sarge and her car packed to the gills. Michael and I made sure both Talaura and Sarge were fed and comfortable before he headed off to bed. Then I stayed up past my bedtime to sit and listen to all of Talaura’s stories of the ridiculousness that is Facebook Market Place. The next morning, I left Talaura sleeping and quietly went into to work to get some things started. Then I went home to help her with her laundry and spend more time with her. Mostly, I wanted her feel slightly better leaving my house than when she arrived and I wanted be there to make sure that happened. Also, I don’t like the idea of anyone having to make the trek down my basement stairs where the washing machine lives. Eventually I was able to send a clean Talaura on her way along with a bag of clean clothes and lots of love.

Recently, I was having a conversation with someone about the skill of listening with an empathetic ear to someone complaining or venting about a problem they are having. The inclination for many us is to want to fix their problem for them. I mentioned to the person I was in conversation with that I had been ‘cured’ of this sort of inclination. When Chris was sick and the doctors determined that there was nothing else we could do, I had to come to terms with the knowledge that I could not fix this. It’s was a real shitty way to be ‘cured’ and now that I’m thinking about, I may not be completely cured. My gut instinct is to say “How can I fix this for you?” I just don’t ever let those words leave my mouth. I’m really good at fixing microscopes but not at fixing peoples’ lives.

So instead of asking how I can fix the problem, I ask “How can I provide you with some comfort?” I still haven’t stopped feeling the want to fix things and this is why I say that I’m only partially cured. Because I do want to fix all of the problems, yours and the worlds’. And sometimes I might still try to fix someone else’s problem before reminding myself that I do I have limitations.

Do what you can, with what you have where you are. -Theadore Roosevelt

I can provide comfort. Comfort comes in many many forms. It’s can be the simple act of opening your home and couch to a dear friend in need. It’s clean clothes or a home cooked meal. But a lot of comfort comes from just being that empathetic ear. What I have come to realize is that I am grateful to be able to provide comfort to my friends. It gives me purpose. My couch will always be available, my doors and arms open. Maybe I need a cross stitch of those words hanging somewhere in my house, not just as a welcome to others but as a reminder to myself.

LETTERS

Before we parted ways for different colleges, a friend and I agreed to stay in touch by writing each other letters. We had known each other since well before pre-school, our lives entwined through church and then school. A friendship born from just living in a small rural community. We joked that we had neighboring cribs in bed-babies class. This is how our Southern Baptist Church separated children out by age. It was a place to leave us while parents attended or led Sunday school classes. We were unavoidably tossed together and it was either be mortal enemies or just be friends. While I was chomping at the bit to escape for college, I was also a little nervous about leaving people behind and he was like a security blanket. So we agreed to write each other as often as possible.

The letters lasted for maybe two or three months, long enough for each of us to settle into new lives. I caught a recent episode of This American Life and the theme for the episode was about writing letters. It started with Ira interviewing some expert on letter writing and brain function. The expert letter writing person talked about the importance of hand written letters, how they convey emotion to the reader but also how the act of letter writing benefits the brain. This is what reminded me about those short few months my friend and I wrote to each other. Every letter I received from him was hand typed while I sent messy scrawling nonsense. Of course our letter writing didn’t last, nor did the friendship. I mean, we’re acquaintances. We both just sorted of faded off into separate worlds. I think he’s doing well, living the white man suburban dream with a wife and two kids, a job in finance. We haven’t seen or spoken in probably twenty years. Our worlds do not align.

That episode on letter writing sparked an urge to maybe write some letters, but then I couldn’t imagine what to tell people. The weather seems to always be a topic for letters. The weather here has been a week of pleasant followed with a week of being boiled and steamed alive. It just swings back and forth like that. In my visions, I picture myself writing in neat loopy letters, not my usual scratch. I think of telling someone in a letter about my tiny garden in the back that has grown wild and messy. There’s swallow tail caterpillars on the fennel and I’ve left them there unharmed in hopes of seeing them transform into butterflies. I think of writing to someone that I feel slightly hopeful for the future, seeing those letters neatly looping across a piece of paper, but the thing that keeps me from writing is the idea that I do not have enough words to fill a page.

Yesterday, I pulled the mail from the mailbox and sifted through the junk and the bills to find a postcard from Amani. It felt like she must have been reading my mind from two thousand miles away. I smiled back the picture of her smiling and flipped the card over to read the short message of love. Then it dawned on me that I did not have to fill pages with handwriting about sweltering temperatures and the next prediction of rain. A couple of sentences will suffice. So then I wasted an hour of time ordering a new set of postcards of some of my photos.

Maybe I’ll practice loopy cursive letters while I wait for the postcards to arrive.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

My friend Sarah introduced me to Chappell Roan back in July and I’m obsessed. I am always a sucker for a female artist who is not afraid to sing explicitly saucy lyrics. This artist does not disappoint. I had her playing on Alexa while I made Michael and I breakfast a few weekends ago. Michael was in the shower and at one point he came out of the bathroom, wrapped in a towel. He was looking at his phone while clutching an imaginary strand of pearls and then said “Have you been listening to these lyrics?!?” I replied “Yes!” and then continued to sing along. He obviously has never been paying attention when I’m playing Missy Elliot or Liz Phair or Wet Leg. I could go on. I want to erase the primitive ideas suggesting that women artists are or should be demure and at the most, PG-13 rated.

I’d like to make the argument that Pink Pony Club is the Girls’ Just Wanna Have Fun of this generation. But more inclusive.

And I heard that there's a special place,
Where boys and girls can all be queens every single day. -Chappell Roan

I am excited and energized by the new artists that have been introduced to me over the past several years. I think it’s easy to settle into the old songs and musicians we know and never open ourselves up to something new. I mean, I still listen to the bands who were my favorites as a teen and young adult. I had The Sundays playing while we got ready for work just the other morning. Even though it’s been a hot minute since the last time I listened to the Flaming Lips, I may have gotten a little jealous about a friend who got free tickets to a concert recently. The Flaming Lips put on a religious experience of a show. But I love it even more when I have a friend ask “Have you heard of…?” and it is someone new to me. Then I listen to this new to me artist and most of the time I fall in love and their music plays on a loop for weeks.

Because there’s more to it than just the joy of experiencing a new artist.

It’s about the joy in sharing. To have a friend who discovers a new artist and then likes that artist so much, they think you will also like them is a gift. It’s like they have found something that makes them feel joy and they want to share that joy with you. This is not limited to music. There is a reason suggested posts about cute animals and hunky firemen show up in my Insta feed. I liked one reel from my friend Wilson ages ago, hence hunky firemen. I’m not mad about it. To share something that brings you joy with others is an act of vulnerability. There’s a certain amount of trust involved with an underlying fear of judgment. “Please don’t make fun of me but I really liked this thing.” I am grateful to be trusted by so many people.

I will never make fun of you.