One day it is spring

a balmy 74 degrees that breaks records in our area. The next day it's winter again. The weather doesn't know what to do with itself. 

When I walk the dog, I wear a sweatshirt and have to shrug out of it before we've made it halfway around the block. In the morning it's back to a coat and hat, a scarf knotted around my neck. I don't know what the dog makes of this. 

The gray sky. The sun. The snow clump in the shady part of the yard. The flowers poking up. But I am having trouble getting my bearings. In therapy I have a breakthrough. 

This is something I haven't talked about with many people--the kind of therapy I'm doing--but it's a big part of my life lately, so I'll mention it. It's called EMDR. Which stands for Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing. Basically, it's a way to manage traumatic memories that are still impacting your life. 

When I first heard about it, I was skeptical, but I was curious too, and open to trying something that might alleviate symptoms. Six weeks into it, and I am finding it weirdly helpful. I only wish I hadn't waited so long. 

For one moment during a session I have an alarming feeling of dizziness. Caught between the past and the present. It's breathtaking. But then the therapist leads me in a grounding exercise (Another handy trick I wish I'd known about years ago), and I am back where I started, but somehow seeing myself for the first time. 

Later, I walk out into the oddly warm day. I bundle up against the cold. The dog scampers happily ahead of me, tail twitching, ears perked up, no matter the weather. 

All week I was reading a book about the secret life of groceries

which a friend had recommended, but I'd put off picking up because I wasn't sure I wanted to know what was going on behind the scenes with my groceries. I suspected it might not be great. 

And I was right. I don't know what to do with this information. I have to eat, which means I have to shop for my food. I know the case can be made that I can grow my own food, and I do, sorta, but I can't grow everything, and it's not like I want to raise chickens in my front yard. (Note to my friend who keeps joking about sending me chickens. Please don't.) 

Some backstory: my front yard has a grub infestation. I discovered the problem last fall, when in the process of cleaning up leaves, I raked up large chunks of the lawn. Turns out grubs had eaten the grass roots and now entire sections easily roll up like an old carpet. Pesticides seem to be the go-to solution, but as a rule I don't spray anything in our yard. After some further research, I learned that chickens eat grubs...  but I don't have chickens.

And I don't want them (I REALLY DON'T, DEB!) But a potential fun small business idea (courtesy of my engineering-brained son who lives on a farm): 

"Rent-a-Chicken," where you rent out your chickens to people who have grub infestations. How it works is you set up a fence around the grubby area and let loose your chickens to do their thing for a few days. Come back with your truck to collect the chickens, and on to their next grubby destination! 

But back to The Secret Life of Groceries: The Dark Miracle of the American Supermarket by Benjamin Lorr. The story is equal parts fascinating and terrible-- whatever Capitalism has to do to give consumers what they want at the moment they want it, and as cheaply as possible, which regardless of how you want to spin it, involves horrific treatment of the people laboring at the bottom of the supply chain. 

The book isn't all dark though. There are chapters on the man behind Trader Joes and one marketing woman's quest to get a coleslaw-like relish on the market and what it's like to work at the fish counter at Whole Foods. Also, what happens on the nights the workers break apart the ice and clean out what's been collecting under that counter. 

Yeah. Probably you don't want to know this. But I hope you will read the book all the same. In the fall when I first discovered the grub infested grass, I had a brief moment of horror, followed by another moment of Let's Pretend I Just Didn't See What I Just Saw. I tamped the dead clumps of lawn back down and decided I'd worry about it later. 

But here I am approaching Later, and I still don't know what to do about the dead lawn. I don't know what to do about the complicated feelings I have about my groceries either. Be grateful, for one, that I have an abundance of food, that someone--many some-ones--did what they had to do to get it to my grocery store. 

And maybe it's time to start looking into renting some chickens? 

  

 

Delightful Blather at the Library

Last week the circulation manager at the library where I work was shelving books and I was sitting at the help desk and the two of us were chatting how we do--I can't remember what we were talking about--but I said something about how we could blather all day, and just then a patron nearby piped up that he liked that word,

blather

and why don't people say it anymore? Well, I have no idea, I responded, but I say it all the time. Which got the three of us talking about other words like that, my favorite being the word delightful, something the circ manager often says, and every time she says it, I think: I like that word. 

Delightful. 

I want to say it more. 

How perky it sounds and how happy, especially on gray cold days, January sliding into February, and all of the crappy news of the world, the terrible ways we treat each other on display again and again, it's hard sometimes to remember how people, the world, can also be delightful.   

I just looked up the definition of delightful and it means "causing delight," and so I looked up delight, and that means "please someone greatly," which pretty much captures it. It was me the other day having a ten-minute discussion with a four-year-old and his grandfather about the library's broken elevator. (Long story about the broken elevator) but the delightful part of it was how curious and concerned the kid was and how patiently the grandfather explained how elevators work (or don't work, as the case may be),

or another day when a preschool class of kids tromped inside out of the cold weather and a little boy kept tromping right over to the desk and hugged me, no idea why, but I'll take it. That day, my husband and I had to get a new furnace, and when I got home, the dog was closed up in a bedroom, frantic about noisy strangers in the house, and I went up to keep her company, which only sorta alleviated her stress. 

Probably because I was borderline frantic myself, thinking about how much money a furnace replacement was going to cost us. Plus, it was cold in the house. Later, when the new furnace was at last installed, I could hear my husband and the furnace guys downstairs blathering, laughing like old friends. 

Right then the heat cranked on and wafted through the vents, and let me tell you, it was absolutely delightful. 

 

This week it was very gray

and that has leaked into everything, de-coloring life from day to day, the dog walks and my work at the library, the meals with my visiting daughter and son-in-law, the afternoons where I sit and try try try to write. Have my moods always been so susceptible to the weather? I complain about it at dinner,

the impenetrable, seemingly never-ending grayness of winter in Columbus, Ohio, and my son-in-law, who has just cooked us another fantastic meal, mishears me and thinks I said "gray anus" and so that is what it is now in my head, Gray Anus Weather. Meanwhile,

at night we are watching The White Lotus, a show about wealthy people at a luxurious resort, which reminds me of old favorite shows from my childhood Love Boat and Fantasy Island, but taking it to such a wild dark place that all of us crammed up on the couch with the dogs can't stop gasping in horror and/or cracking up. Humans are so terrible and ridiculous. 

I have sworn off the news but it still creeps in. More gun deaths. Crazy politicians and stupid fights in DC. The price of eggs. I am reading a book about memory and how our default setting is to forget. Don't worry, the author says, if you forget where you left your car keys or if you can't remember why you entered a room, the important thing is you know what car keys are, and you can find your way out of the room. I am embarrassed to admit how greatly relieved I am to read this. 

The author also says that we are more likely to remember emotionally significant events. Most other things slip away forever. Unless we write them down. The trouble with me is I write everything down. 

My daughter and son-in-law head home, and our house is quiet again. Lonely. In the morning (I was going to say "when the sun comes up" but there is no sun) So, to revise: In the morning when the sky lightens, it looks like it is going to be another gray anus day. 

Instead, it begins to snow. Thick and swirling and quickly covering the bare tree branches, the lawn, the street. The whole world outside my window grows white and bright. I want to revise again. It’s going to be a good day. 

Two Dog Week

Once upon a time I hated dogs. I was afraid of them. And for good reason. A dog I had growing up bit my face, his teeth tearing through the side of my mouth, a part of my lip left dangling. 

I was twelve. I loved that dog. His name was Sam and he was a rescue. He was sweet. And also, vicious, hurling his body against the front door when anybody dared to knock. But until the moment he bit my face, he had never been vicious to me. The thing was

I'd been stupid, leaning over to kiss his darling face while he was asleep. I'd scared him and who could blame him for lashing out. Not me, is what I'm trying to say. We all do things we may regret when we're afraid. 

But still, there was the matter of the bloody mouth, the dangling lip. I knew I needed help, but being something of a rescue myself, I wasn't sure where to go for it. My stepfather, for example, had threatened to kill the dog. My mother did not typically react well in a crisis. But twelve is old enough to know when there are situations too difficult to navigate on your own.

In the end my stepfather did not kill the dog. My mother did not react well to my bloody face reveal but pulled herself together and got me medical care. Life went on for all of us, me, with a scar no one can see, and for the next twenty-five years, a terror and hatred of dogs. 

Until, 

I got a dog. I won't bore you with the details of her intelligence, her adorable-ness, her loyalty. Over the next ten years what first began as a tolerance, quickly turned into friendship, into love, and beyond that, a love that could extend to other dogs too. Which brings me to the events of this week when my daughter and son-in-law asked my husband and me to watch their dog, and halfway through the week, my husband went out of town,

leaving me alone with the two dogs.

During the period of my life when I was afraid of dogs, I did not know how different dogs could be from each other and I did not really care. A dog is a dog, is what I thought, and please get it the hell away from me. But here I was this week juggling the two dogs, my sweet Zooey, and the bigger, and I don't want to say dumber, but maybe... not quite as intelligent, but still darling, lumbering, goofy Louie. 

I have gotten such a kick out of them, Zooey and Louie, clambering up beside me at night on the couch while I read, their forays into the backyard, bonding over their mutual outrage at the existence of squirrels, our ridiculous walks around the block, the two of them continually stopping to sniff or pee in opposite directions, a near constant crossing and crisscrossing of leashes, leaving all of us tired out and ready to snuggle again.

Once, I hated dogs. Once, I was afraid of them. And all of that fear and anger tangled up inside my childhood self, solidifying as I grew up, becoming an integral part of who I was.

But last night alone in the dark, a warm body pressed on either side of me, the snores and sleepy sighs, the thumps of their hearts, I felt more of that old self untangle. 

Dear Sam, I'm so sorry I scared you. Dear twelve-year-old Jody, it wasn't your fault. 

 

 

The Case of the Mysterious Smell

It was burnt plastic. Actually, more like burnt metal, my husband insisted. Either way something smelled bad in the living room, and it was freaking me out. 

The logical culprit was the Christmas tree. It's a fake tree with strands of lights already strung in the branches, and this year (the fourth year we've put up this tree), we'd noticed that some of the lights had fizzled out. Was there faulty wiring in the tree, something wrong with the electrical cords? 

My husband and I sniffed carefully around the branches. We unplugged the light strand. The plastic-y (metallic?) burning smell did not abate. Or maybe it did? It was hard to tell. The smell basically had permeated the entire room at this point.  

We'd just been sitting down to watch the latest installment of a show we've been streaming, the mystery series CB Strike that my brother had gotten us hooked on when he was visiting over Christmas. The show is about a British down-on-his-luck detective who teams up with his plucky receptionist to solve gruesome murder mysteries. It's very well done, despite the gruesome-ness. 

At the same time, I've been reading a mystery-thriller set in Ireland written by my friend Edie Pattou. The book is a manuscript she asked our writing group to look at and I was immediately caught up in the story. A missing girl. Perhaps several missing girls. A plucky American author (struggling with some demons) teaming up with a grizzled Irish detective (struggling with his own demons). 

The point is I had mysteries on the brain. What was the source of this horrible odor in the living room? If it wasn't the Christmas tree, could it be... 

the TV? 

The TV is situated very close to the Christmas tree. It's also quite a bit older. Maybe eight years? What is the lifespan of these things? My husband and I sniffed around the back of the TV screen. The multiple cords. The firestick thing-y. The speakers. Any one of those could be the cause. We unplugged it all. And still, the burning smell. 

Oh my God. What if the house was on fire? 

My husband, (the grizzled detective) (as opposed to me, the plucky heroine battling anxiety demons), checked on the smoke detectors to make sure they were all in working order. And then he began googling replacement trees, replacement TVs. Only day 5, 6 or whatever into my New Year's Resolution to be more purposeful about spending, and darn it all to hell, were we going to have to buy something?!

I went to bed with the burn-y smell in my nostrils, the gruesome British murder mysteries and Edie's missing Irish girls, all twining up in my head. In the morning when my husband and I were getting ready to do our morning yoga stretches with Kassandra with K, I switched on the lamp next to the TV. It did not turn on. 

I checked the cord. My husband peered over the lampshade at the bulb. He gasped.  

The Case of the Mysterious Smell.

Solved. 

Purposeful Purchasing

Is my New Year's Resolution this year, inspired by an essay in one of the books I read recently, Ann Patchett’s These Precious Days, in which she details how she quit buying anything for a year. 

Like Ann Patchett, who heard about this idea and immediately thought: HOW IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE? But then, another thought: WHY NOT? I too find myself buying things I don't really need, and worrying about the endless pursuit of stuff and what that does to me, to us, to the planet. 

But then, I circled back to the HOW part. Ann Patchett created some exceptions for herself. Buying food, for example, or really, anything you can purchase at a grocery store. Also, she allowed herself to buy books. (She's an author and a bookstore owner. Books, she decided, had to be an exception.)

But I work at a library. And as much as I enjoy buying books, it's pretty clear that I don't really need to. 

Maybe I can actually do this! I explain to my husband my new plan for the year, and he is intrigued, but more interested in the exceptions we'll have to carve out. What if something breaks? (See: refrigerator) or, we need, say, lightbulbs?

Okay, to buying a new appliance. But lightbulbs, we can buy at a grocery store, my one exception. Ditto: stuff like, shampoo. I tell him he can make any exceptions he wants. Tools, for example, and supplies for his woodworking projects. We spend the six-hour car ride to our annual New Year's Eve multi-family/multi-day gathering celebration going over more exceptions. 

Gifts? Sure! Dog toys? (the dog is panting anxiously in the backseat) Okay! 

By the time we arrive at our destination, we have a refined plan. Not No Buying Anything, but something more like a flow chart model of spending that we call "Purposeful Purchasing." 

Before buying anything, we will now ask ourselves:

Do we really want this thing? 

Can we do without it? 

Can we reuse or repair or borrow?

Can we buy this thing locally or at a thrift store?

Do we really really really want this thing? 

I write the Resolution in the New Year's Eve book and it is now official. But first, one pre-exception. 

At the annual Buy Food and Fun Stuff before the New Year's Eve party, I go a little crazy with whatever the opposite of Purposeful Purchasing is, buying copious amounts of junk food, a rice cooker (my son mentioned that he wished he had one) and an absurd candy bouquet located by the check out.

The candy bouquet makes me laugh, later, when I walk by the snack table, all of that junk food and plastic and the silly floppy bow. Don’t need it. Don’t even want it. But the ridiculousness of it gives me great joy. 

The real joy, though, is for this place, the people gathered here with me. My husband, our kids and their significant others, our longtime friends. This is all I want. This is all I need.

Here. Today. The perfect way to ring in the New Year.