1. Practice. I had a really hard week, and some of the things that saved me were a guided meditation to ease anxiety, teaching my yoga class at Red Sage, and writing with my Friday morning sangha.
2. Morning rest in the blue light with the blue dog. There were no morning walks because Ringo has been struggling with some pain in his back end, and we’ve been resting him and working with his “team” to get it sorted.
3. Sometimes comfort is a loaf of cinnamon swirl bread from The Bread Chic. Sometimes, it is an emergency therapy session. Sometimes it is a nap. Sometimes it is a good cry. Sometimes it is a poem. Sometimes it is a warm shower. Sometimes it is a hug in the kitchen. Sometimes it is a slow drive around the cemetery with all the windows rolled down. Sometimes it is texting with Chloe’ and Chris, without even telling them you are struggling. Sometimes it’s a massage with Dana where you tell her exactly all the ways you are struggling. Sometimes it is watching part of a movie. Sometimes it is listening to a podcast or some Teddy Swims loud in the car with all the windows rolled down even if it means you have to turn on the heat. Sometimes it is drinking a can of grapefruit Bubly sparkling water. Sometimes it is canceled plans. Sometimes it is not finishing the book you are reading and starting another. Sometimes it is sending what feels like the perfect gift through snail mail. Sometimes it’s butter or cheese or something salty. Sometimes it’s your dog’s vet seeing that you are worried and saying something, and then telling you, “I’ll take care of him like he’s my own dog, without all the crying” and knowing for sure she’s telling you the truth. Sometimes it’s making a joke and other times it’s keeping quiet. I’m grateful for all the forms it takes.
4. Lounging in the sun in the backyard with your dog. Am I aware that all the sun and warmth we’ve had this winter is bad news, that it’s going to lead to dry ground and increased fire danger and too much heat this summer? Yup. Do I know that it is a sign of the climate crisis, soon to be apocalypse? Yes, absolutely. Would I rather have colder temperatures and lots of snow? For sure. Did I allow myself to enjoy it anyway. Yes, yes I did.
5. My tiny family, small house, little life. Like I said, this week and honestly the week before it were so hard, but still, there’s no one I’d rather do it with, no one I’d rather do my life with, including all the hard parts.
Bonus joy: Annie’s mac & cheese, burritos, toast, pay day, a big glass of cold clean water, Ringo out in the backyard barking, Ringo’s “team” of doctors, getting in the pool, sitting in the sauna, chatting with Sally, citrus, pickled red onions, texts from Monica and Cynthia and Jessamy, the things I brought home from Mom’s that I see and use at my house now, a hot cup of coffee and warm mug of tea, finding tiny pockets of calm, tiny brass animals — the ones I’ve kept and the ones I’ve given away, online shopping, listening to comedy albums at night with Eric instead of watching TV (not that I have anything against watching TV), video shorts on YouTube, tortilla chips, plantain chips, how I always feel better after doing yoga, that tiny corgi walking by our house as I was leaving today who I said “hi” to and how happy it made her person, other people’s kids and pets, Ringo’s appetite, the riot of bird song in the backyard, to be known and loved anyway, making each other laugh, ice cubes, naps, libraries and librarians, poetry and poets, comedy and comedians, music and musicians, stickers, blank notebooks and pens with refillable ink, downloading books from the library onto my Kindle, reading in bed at night while Eric and Ringo sleep.
P.S. A strange thing happened this week as I read through poems, selecting which ones to share: there were quite a few where my heart said, “nope, I can’t,” all of it just too raw and tender, both the poetry and my heart. It was like I was going through the house, hiding all the scissors and sharp knives, anything that might cut you or be used to cut, as if I could keep any of us safe.
5. Forevergreen. (video) “Nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film. An orphaned bear cub finds a home with a fatherly evergreen tree, until his hunger for trash leads him to danger.”
7. Mark Nepo: Age Like a Meteor, a Sounds True podcast. “What if aging isn’t about decline, but about becoming brighter—like a meteor that grows more luminous even as it falls through the atmosphere? Tami Simon speaks with beloved poet-philosopher Mark Nepo about his deeply moving new book, The Fifth Season: Creativity in the Second Half of Life. Drawing from Chinese wisdom traditions and his own journey through chronic pain and back surgery, Mark illuminates aging as the ‘heavenly pivot’ (love that phrase) which is the transformative shift from living outwardly to inhabiting life from the inside out. Mark’s wisdom arises from decades of spiritual practice, surviving cancer, and facing the inevitable losses that come with a long life—essential listening for anyone navigating aging, chronic pain, loss, or simply seeking to live more fully present to the life they have.”
10. Pat Porter: A Hidden Light, a documentary that “celebrates the life and work of Pat Porter (1944-2022), a prolific painter whose intimate still lifes, landscapes, and portraits were created over decades but never publicly shown during her lifetime.” (Thanks to Helen for sharing this on her weekly Slow-Small Media list).
11. Kumail Nanjiani: Night Thoughts (trailer). “After nearly a decade away, Kumail Nanjiani returns to Chicago, where he got his start in standup, in a new special that tackles anxiety, the perils of buying drugs pre-legalization, and most importantly, cat medication.” I just watched this and it was really funny, and also so sweet. In related news, Zoltan Kaszas: London Fog was another good one, and you can watch the whole thing for free on YouTube. “In his new stand-up special London Fog, comedian Zoltan Kaszas wrestles with anxiety, explores the many modern paths to parenthood, and reflects on growing up with a single immigrant mother—all while trying not to let success change him.”
12. What Love Looks Like, “a conversation on love, humanity, and spirituality with Tim DeChristopher” by Terry Tempest Williams and Tim DeChristopher on Orion. This is a few years old, but I just read it (as one of the essays included in her recent collection Erosion: Essays of Undoing). I’m so glad it’s available online so I can share it with you, in particular this section, which is weirdly hopeful even in its dire prediction:
TTW: But if it’s true, what Terry Root first told you — that there is no hope — then what’s the point?
TDC: Well there’s no hope in avoiding collapse. If you look at the worst-case consequences of climate change, those pretty much mean the collapse of our industrial civilization. But that doesn’t mean the end of everything. It means that we’re going to be living through the most rapid and intense period of change that humanity has ever faced. And that’s certainly not hopeless. It means we’re going to have to build another world in the ashes of this one. And it could very easily be a better world. I have a lot of hope in my generation’s ability to build a better world in the ashes of this one. And I have very little doubt that we’ll have to. The nice thing about that is that this culture hasn’t led to happiness anyway, it hasn’t satisfied our human needs. So there’s a lot of room for improvement.
TTW:How has this experience — these past two years — changed you?
TDC: [Sighing.] It’s made me worry less.
TTW: Why?
TDC: It’s somewhat comforting knowing that things are going to fall apart, because it does give us that opportunity to drastically change things.
16. How Will the Miracle Happen Today? by Kevin Kelly on DailyGood. “Kindness is like a breath. It can be squeezed out, or drawn in. You can wait for it, or you can summon it. To solicit a gift from a stranger takes a certain state of openness. If you are lost or ill, this is easy, but most days you are neither, so embracing extreme generosity takes some preparation. I learned from hitchhiking to think of this as an exchange. During the moment the stranger offers his or her goodness, the person being aided can reciprocate with degrees of humility, dependency, gratitude, surprise, trust, delight, relief, and amusement to the stranger. It takes some practice to enable this exchange when you don’t feel desperate. Ironically, you are less inclined to be ready for the gift when you are feeling whole, full, complete, and independent! One might even call the art of accepting generosity a type of compassion. The compassion of being kinded.”
19. Five minutesby Jami Attenberg on Craft Talk. “Because five minutes can lead to ten. Because a month of five minutes adds up to a few new pages. Because five minutes a day can trigger or sustain momentum. Because those five minutes might be the best part of your day. Because those five minutes could feel like saving your life.”
21. Having Fun With Reality. “Street art isn’t just about paint on a wall. The true masters know how to work with the environment—using the sun, shadows, and even the time of day to complete their masterpieces. From shadows that turn into monsters to fountains that glow like lava at sunset, here are 10 incredible artworks that play with reality.”
Open Space Practice, (AKA: A Thousand Shades of Gray) 