This week I began to surface from an intense few months at work. Everyone has different thresholds for stress, but operating in fight-or-flight mode mutes everything around you except your immediate focus. Do this for too long and you will start to lose touch with the basics of everyday life.
My surroundings are coming back into focus again, and it’s been kind of joyful to reconnect with the world around me. It’s happening just as the glorious foliage here in New England is slipping into shades of brown, but I’ve been so happy to catch even the end of the season that I am not even depressed by the later sunrise and deeper darks. I’m anticipating the holidays; I’m craving a crackling wood stove; I’m doodling turkeys.
It is hard to reconcile this quiet happiness with [checks headlines and gestures broadly at everything]. There’s a strange guilt attached to being content in the face of stark reality. Still, I’m so relieved to be emerging back into my life that I’m defiantly leaning into appreciating the small things.
Here are some bright lights from my week:
Putting on my puffy coat to watch a soccer game
Finding the mason jar of flowers that my sister left at the kitchen sink
Replacing 3mm shelf pegs to repair a bookcase successfully
Watching a chickadee give a solo concert
Making a quick fix to a database for a small business (the subform was trying to sort by a missing field—I know you wanted to know!)
Seeing the line of morning fog that shows where the river snakes through the woods
Having a stranger’s dog ask for a head scratch
Watching my kids share a joke
Seeing my mom start painting again
Scuffling through leaves on the sidewalk, and inhaling that glorious smell
There were plenty of ratty moments too, but somehow resurfacing to my normal day-to-day has made them feel less significant. Also, I’m building the muscles to trot over to the sunny side of the street. I’m learning to remember the good stuff.
Lots of us face clinical depression, personal tragedies, and other innumerable and overwhelming situations that preclude joy. At other times, we may walk through our lives in a gray area. Are things going well or devolving? Was it a good day or a bad day? Nobody will argue when we acknowledge the difficult stuff because it’s everywhere. I see now, though, that reframing when we can—snatching some happiness from the jaws of despair—is far more a triumph of the will than it is naïveté.
These moments of contentment have been nurturing my optimism. I’m starting to understand how embracing joy can be activism. I’m turning toward this winter with a radical’s mindset.
In Other News
I’ve been lurking admiringly around several writers on this platform, and wanted to share the limited, collaborative Substack series Notes from Three Pines. I love mysteries but didn’t know the Inspector Gamache series; the love these writers have for both the characters and the (eponymous) setting is contagious.
If you’re looking to get into the holiday spirit ASAP, stay tuned…later this week I’ll be sharing some process peeks around the Very Doodle Dispatches holiday offerings I’ll be updating over on my website. Coupons! Seasonal monsters! More turkeys!
Shortly after my last post on gossip, Anne Helen Petersen did a superb analysis of Pitt vs. Jolie. If you are interested in delving into some Smart Gossip™ but don’t know where to start, may I suggest starting here?
This morning, just after my draft was ready to post, I was felled by a horrible cold the likes of which I haven’t felt since…well, Covid (it’s not Covid). I’m achey and snotty and self-pitying, but in the spirit of this Substack, I’ll note that I’m grateful for Aleve-D. It is tamping down my headache enough to allow me to go to sleep before 8PM (I hope), and I wish you all similar efficiencies with whatever obstacles you face this week.
I hope you're feeling better very soon!
I would like to grow up to be like you