The world is cruel and irrational. I think this dark season will usher in an auspicious time. However, I’m a high-functioning anxious person so I’m hopeful but nervous. Various people have recommended gratitude and/or accomplishment lists for their calming effects. While I believe in gratitude, I prefer making an accomplishment list, which gives me the impression of inertia. I want to go on a journey. Today, I’m just taking stock. Please humor me while I write a list of accomplishments. If you are so moved, you can make one, too, it feels good!
In the past week …
I researched, created, and delivered two lectures for undergraduates, with slides and a worksheet. I began two more. I also graded 100 short essays on gender and technology and constitutive rules and games. Best of all, the microphone worked on the first try!
I ran a 5k, walked a 5k to support a friend who had/is healing colorectal cancer, bicycled for two hours, and went on a two-hour family hike. No injuries!
I read four academic articles on speech acts and performativity, wrote a job application, saved seven jobs to apply for, and scrolled social media for five hours (not all at once), contributed to five conversations about writing and/or parenting. And I remembered twice to take notes using my computer!
I did three Wordles. I beat the bot once!
I read news about the unfolding war between Israel and Palestine (New York Times, Al Jazeera, The Guardian) and reached out to my friends with connections to the region. I said the Metta prayer. May all beings be peaceful. I wrote it down. I prayed with the children, and they giggled. Beans? Peaceful beans?
I sent one follow-up email about an essay that I wrote and edited and edited and proofread two weeks ago about why I think everyone should go to a naked spa which was infamously sued for excluding transwomen wherein I make a surprisingly, bewitching, inclusive point about this otherwise-painful situation using affect theory and feminism and Sara Ahmed and Clarice Lispector. I had pitched it to the New York Times; after the radio silence to my follow-up email, I contributed to two online forums hoping for reassurance that the silence and disappointment are normal, and I should keep going.
I read a novel, three long-reads, four newsletters, and one short story (more on what I’d recommend, below). I contributed to one Substack forum on why to write a newsletter. I was notified that one writing class I pitched will run in winter, and another will not. Win some, lose some.
I trucked my children around town to various enrichment activities that happen between 4-7:30pm, daily. While waiting, I edited my novel on my phone. I deleted several darlings and patted myself on the back.
Entertained friends for dinner. Nothing burned. An umbrella almost blew off the deck, which was nice because a little harmless show is entertaining.
I packed seven lunches, made several dinners, several breakfasts, took out the recycle, took out the garbage, and took out the compost. I caught 37 fruit flies in my homemade fruit fly trap.
I picked quinces and followed a Turkish recipe to candy the quince. I succeeded in creating a big sticky mess and a social media post about things going wrong.
I gave figs to my neighbors and friends. I nearly ate the entire jar of homemade raspberry jam from a friend.
I vacuumed twice, I spot-mopped the kitchen. I did six loads of laundry. I changed the bed sheets. I cleaned two toilets including the baseboards.
I called my mom twice.
I sent 14 emails, texted with six friends, texted with my sister, and helped my dad solve a minor software issue.
I played Go Nuts for Donuts with the children and let them make annoying fart noises and shrieks without reprimands for the duration of the game. It lasted 47 minutes. You can guess who won.
I went for a 30-minute walk near the sea with my lover. We talked about our calendars and how we might begin to prioritize home projects and our jobs. Adulting!
I woke up at 4:45a on four mornings and wrote 5,000 words for two half-finished essays and 1,000 words for my in-progress novel. Again, adulting!
I didn’t drink alcohol, didn’t watch shows for pleasure, didn’t grocery shop, but I put up one Halloween decoration.
I skipped an exercise class I’d planned to attend.
I let the bok choy rot in the crisper.
My daily Buddha calendar, quoting Anonymous, reminds me:
“We only have a limited amount of time and a limitless number of different paths to go down—"
Do not feel guilty for the paths not taken.In the afternoon, I lay by my son on a grass field, blushing clouds above. The sun hasn’t set yet. The rain hasn’t started yet. I breathe in sap and relief. I watch his soft exhale, his fingernails filled with dirt, waiting with me. It’s not his turn. His chest rises and falls, with anticipation, he gets up to run again.
What to read
Why I couldn’t Stop Thinking About ‘Kony 2012’ by Emma Maddon. Big social media events have changed in the past decade, Emma Maddon shows us a turning point.
They Studied Dishonesty: Was Their Work A Lie? by Gideon Lewis-Kraus. The schadenfreude of Anna Delvey in the upper echelons of academia.
Territorial Claims by Rachel Arteaga—Three stories of a family on rural Washington coast. An emotional tapestry, in words; the most moving short fiction I’ve read in a while. <3
Laying My Dead Dad Novel To Rest by Cari Luna. How a book about grief can believe in god, and how the writer has come to faith, too. I took a novel editing class with Cari, would recommend both her classes and this poignant essay on reluctant faith.
Book recommendation
Earlier this week, I read The Candy House, by Jennifer Egan. Written in the same style as A Visit From The Goon Squad, and follows the same characters, but is set mostly in the near future and grapples with the darker effects of technology and alienation, the costs of power, and the deep, bruising, beautiful forms that love takes. On that note, this passage stuck with me:
“When I was little, I had a fear of dying in my sleep. Mom never said, ‘That’s silly. You’re going to live forever, sweetheart, and so am I, and so is our whole family and everyone we love.’ Instead, she got out her stethoscope, hospital-grade thermometer, and blood pressure cuff, and took my vital signs.
“‘Normal,’ she said. ‘You won’t die tonight.’
“According to Mom, you have to be careful or the forces of doom will line up against you. Things are more connected than they seem. The world is cruel and irrational. The strong thrive at the expense of the weak, and happy endings are purely a matter of framing. […] Nowadays I find it painful to have a mom who’s widely perceived as unhinged—a mom my friends laugh at. But when I was young and she was all I knew, I lived inside a force field that shielded me from every danger without concealing it. She made me strong.” (pp. 233-4).
I like the idea of unvarnished, dogged realism from a caring, if unhinged, mother. She will protect us from impending doom. Take your vital signs. Are you still there? Make a list of what you’ve done. The world is cruel and irrational, but we don’t have to conceal that. We can be strong and go on.
Thank you for reading The Gift.
Until next time,
Monika
The Gift