Of friendship and laundry

I am standing at the kitchen table with steaming Bournvita, the mug full and hot-milky with malt and sugar and chocolate. I subscribe to the newspaper so I can pencil in the crossword, but today is October 7th and the front page is talking about a year of kerfuffle that has been (as they say, geopolitically), an absolute PR nightmare.

So much happens in a year.

A year ago, at the beginning of Fall, I was going through soft, raw pain as I trudged through three breakups and a rekindling of some old, old ghosts, in my tired, tired body. I felt awful. I spent far too long crying into blankets that would now need to be put in the wash, but I didn't wash the blankets for weeks anyway because I'd only cry into them again immediately. I got very sick and perhaps we will talk about that sometime, some other time, but for now know only that I filled the next about 525,600 minutes of the year with things done, with things attempted, haphazardly, well-enough. Mostly, I learned to rest.

Last fall, I began to curl into myself, like a burning strip of paper. But in the winter I started journaling again and one indulgent fact I will admit to is that sometimes when I'd read over a journal entry from a few days prior, I would find a line that made me chuckle, and even in the times-of-nothing, I guess I really did have that: I had the obnoxious, delicious gift of finding myself funny.

—

At the end of this summer I danced saké-drunk at my first and only concert the whole year. My vision of myself in the midst of live music went from being a thing of joy (last spring), to a thing of fear (fall, winter), to a thing of abandon and courage (today, new fall): jumping up and down with your fist thrown in the air is so punk, as is dancing alongside kissing strangers.

—

Between last fall and this fall, in the 525,600 minutes in the interim, I first got progressively sicker, but then I also started getting better. I took myself to the movies, I learned to be better at receiving love. I took up sewing and then gave up on it because it hurt my arm too much, but for a little bit I made a few skirts and bought an absurd amount of fabric from JoAnn's. My arm hurt always, so I folded no laundry all year. Instead I kicked myself, wanted to fold laundry but couldn't fold laundry, needed to fold laundry, couldn't trust the body; what was I worth if I couldn't even fold laundry, couldn't be of any use; if I couldn't stake any claim, place any bets, take up any space?

I learned, am learning, will never learn, will maybe someday learn: to rest. I learn that it is okay to some days, some years, give up on the laundry.

Last fall I was cradled by friends I've had for a long long time and I watched The Lord of The Rings: Two Towers (Extended Edition, Director’s Cut) and understood slightly more plot than I have on previous watches. My friends, who are superfans and embarrassed about my ignorance, love me anyway, or so they claim.

—

Last fall, when the friends and I drove across the river to soft, yellow-leaved Philly, my Historian friend described how now there would be war, there would be a scene, there was no turning back now. I sat unruffled; I will admit I was Not In The Know. I had vague approximations of the situation in Palestine, but I did not Know. But then by the time I learned more things about Palestine I could not feel anything about it because the shadowy times had arrived and I was properly sick.

In the winter, while I was still poorly and trying to get better, friends I love fed me warm rasam in bed. Crumpled tissues lay scattered from pillow to distant floor despite my obvious preference for the duvet cover as handkerchief. I felt gentle hand-squeezes which meant that I had had to let other people hold my hands, feel how cold my skin could get. If you knew how difficult hand-holding in times of need is, for me, I think perhaps you too would be proud of me.

When light was finally around the corner, and spring was coming, I knew about it because my feelings started returning. Like gasps of air. I could wonder again about why the machines of war use people like pawns. Palestine was one of the first things that made me feel the grief of love again, that gave me reason to care again, I think.

—
In the new spring I got pepper-sprayed in the face and it hurt less than I expected it to, even though it still hurt a lot, and I think that is my review for the whole past year, really. It hurt less than I expected it to, ultimately, even though it still hurt a lot, and it seems to have been worth it, for me, anyway. ymmv.

—

Through the summer I learned to scoop back air into my lungs, make space for the roomy breath of things, I learned how to be kinder to myself, I learned to trust in the wishy-washy ineffable things. I learned how to feel the slosh, the lap-lapping waves of feeling and thought and electricity, soft-swooshing against the sands of my strong, soft body, keeping my tiny personage strengthening, softening. Some days, now, I feel like Roald Dahl’s Matilda, small and book-strong and kind and witchy. Like I can tip over a glass of water with just the sparks in my brain. It is not what I'd expected to grow into but it's still very cool.

My friends say I'm cool and I choose to believe it; they are not the sort of friends who would say words only to please me; they are however the sort of friends that would say words just to delight me. As painful and unexpected as the year was, I still gained so many things. Anyway know only that I spent the last about 525,600 minutes with things done, things attempted, haphazardly, and well-enough. Being able to rest is a beautiful privilege. You have to be able to ignore the laundry, sometimes. It gives you the time and space to feel your way to the surface.

If you spend the whole year under the shadow of pain and grief and bombs, does it feel like not just your family and your home and country, but also your time also has been stolen from you? 525,600 minutes of things left undone, un-pursued, far from perfect. Palestinians will maybe someday learn: to rest. Be given the space, the grace, to rest. I assume that they too wish that someone else would handle the laundry sometimes.

—

There is so much to say and keep repeating when you're feeling your way back to the surface - not to the Light, but just to the regular, happy, warm light of day - because every small happening feels magnificent and essential. It is so hard to say anything at all when you’re still underground, beneath the shadows, having to save all your breath folding your own laundry.

When you’re tucked under the earth for a bit and learning to be a person again you need time and space and handholding and rasam from your friends. I know only that without my friends, I would not have been able to spend the last about 525,600 minutes with things done, things attempted, haphazardly, well-enough.

I want for us to be the kind of friends who help each other rest, find rest, build rest. Maybe someday we’ll learn how.