• 

I’m so tired.

I regret all the times I said I was tired pre-quarantine. Just like, after having children, I regretted all the times I’d said I was tired before having them.

Because now, as then, I’m experiencing a new kind of tiredness. A new level of exhaustion. I’ve been left wondering if I’m iron-deficient, or have a serious illness. I struggle through runs that used to be…if not easy, then doable, feeling as though I’m wearing ankle weights. I can’t seem to get enough sleep, the alarm set pre-COVID giving way to lingering in bed and an anger over having to leave it. I feel breathless walking up stairs.

I am so tired.

And I’d be more worried, if 1) I had space for more worry; and 2) everyone around me weren’t saying the same thing. They’re so tired too, except for the Instagram overachievers who’ve gone public with all their PRs, but my “they” refers to the people around me, the ones who nod their heads slowly, The Husband commiserating over his own shitty runs; another daily presence commiserating over her own panic attacks and inability to switch from a 6 am wakeup to an even later one without feeling drained.

And who knows, maybe I do need more iron (talk to me about leafy greens right now at your own peril), but I definitely know this: there is a weight upon me that wasn’t there before; and maybe a weight that was there, but that I was distracted from feeling.

Homeschool (distance learning, whatever) starts back tomorrow. I want to punch something just writing that. I am angry about being my children’s teacher, their alternating slavedriver and saviour from it, pushing for completion one minute and throwing my arms up in an “F it all” pose the next (consistency can shove it right now). There is the weight of being a newly-minted, unqualified teacher of two grades and the awareness that comes with it of all they have to learn–to be taught–and the one–me–apparently responsible for that. It’s too much. It’s too heavy.

And then there are the weights that I was distracted from feeling; the awarenesses that didn’t register because I was moving too fast. There are no distractions now from my own chaotic mind, from my own anxiety and introspection. Life used to have a baseline of movement: daily walks, twice over, to the boys’ school, pilgrimages into the world, travels. Now stillness is life’s point of reference: we’re always either at, or headed, home. And home–stillness–for all its noise, is quieter.

Social media still exists, so plenty of us are still adept at evading ourselves and any self-awareness a lengthy interaction with our “selves” can bring. But I’m meeting the unavoidable-for-me beast head on: I am my own observer. I see myself wanting to use online retail therapy to feel better. I see myself noticing, more, how alcohol affects my sleep (and my runs, and my moods) and I have to figure out what to do about that. How food does the same.

I see how I have to be my own advocate, even while caring for others. How an introvert must claim space or go insane–or at least into a panic attack. How I have to send my regrets to some Zoom meetings because that is space I need for myself right now, at a time when we are all so surrounded by each other, in this house at least. How meditation–and by that I simply mean being in the present moment, without judgment, for more than five seconds–is essential. How prayer is oxygen. How humour is a life raft. How books for me, and iPads for the kids, have to happen. How saying NO to the voices that chant “Do more! Make this time count!” is not just self-care, but wisdom itself.

“Every man rushes elsewhere into the future because no man has arrived at himself,” wrote Michel de Montaigne, who is quoted in the book my friend gave me, which has been its own lifeline. And what’s funny and perfect about right now? WE HAVE NO FUTURE TO RUSH INTO! SO WE CAN EITHER RUN IN CIRCLES OR INTO OURSELVES. Sarah Wilson, the author of said book, says about de Montaigne: “He shared through his writing that freedom from the restlessness in our beings could only be achieved by actively resisting the pull outwards and into the future, and instead learning to ‘stay at home’.”

Ha. #stayathome.

On the way back from our daily trip to the beach this morning, the boys asked to hear “My Shot,” and as the familiar tune reached my ears, I thought for a second something was wrong, then realised that no, my phone hadn’t somehow slowed down the tempo. It was always at that speed. Everything feels slow right now, because I’m trying to speed it up. I am being called to stillness. To my family. To myself. And to the grace that waits there.

• 

Our house smells like farts, and I had another panic attack, at 1 am last night.

We made an offer on a house whose marble countertops and double-headed shower felt like a ship on its way to rescue us, the Carpathia en route to the Titanic, but that one–our third–didn’t work out either, so we’re left to rot in moist-carpet hell.

Also, The Husband gave our precious, beautiful boys some haircuts that have been compared (by me) as Dumb and Dumber meets concentration camp.

What I’m saying is that these conditions are not tense, or a strain, or simply tough. They’re warfare. This is not normal–none of it is. So to react normally would actually be…a bit insane? To not lose one’s shit over their oat milk being shared without their permission? To step on that damp(est) part of the carpet and not want to punch a hole in the wall? To hear the kids complain about their charmed lives (but not haircuts) and not want to send them on a one-way ticket to a third-world country? That would be insane. And I am seriously wary of anyone who is taking all of this well.

But, per usual, I’m wary of anyone who is making it all out to be one thing, good or bad, without nuance. Because even in this messy reality of life together, I’m seeing what just would never have been without it: mornings spent at the beach, digging and exploring. Movie nights, every night (fun fact: we alternate between TWO of them! JUST TWO!). Board-game sessions spent teaching Little Brother the drawbacks of not winning fair and square (he has yet to internalise this). Impromptu trampoline sessions the boys get to have with The Husband (another fun fact: I tried, at forty-two years of age, to jump on the trampoline! It did not go well! My knee was hit with a piercing pain and it felt like my rectum fell out!).

Still, the hardest part of it all may be…me. Julia-Louis Dreyfus, one of the only celebs allowed to talk right now, recently posted a photo of herself with the caption, “Look, I’m just gonna say it. I’m fucking sick of myself.”

GIRL, SAME. I am sick of what’s been revealed about me during this time: how I can turn even an unstructured day into a set of rules, as if we don’t get to the beach before 9 am everything will FALL APART. How my thoughts won’t ever slow down, EVEN WHILE I AM ASLEEP APPARENTLY. How my indulgence in “quaran-wine” is going to have to be dialled back a notch because it’s affecting my sleep and is officially an overindulgence. How I rely on order and cleanliness around our house to maintain a certain level of well-being and THAT IS JUST NOT POSSIBLE IN FARTLAND, IS IT??

But.

Occasionally, like at one in the morning the day before two “huge social outings” (The Kid’s speech therapy appointment and my trip to the salon, cue the angels’ chorus) on a stomach full of wine, I (re)learn the simple truth that I am not my own saviour. That the line I used to venerate from the poem “Invictus”–“I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul”–may be some inspirational shit, but as far as it goes with me it’s just shit because (1) I’m terrible with directions, and (2) I cannot save myself. From myself, or from anything else. Salvation must come from the outside.

Which is why strategies don’t work. They can help–drinking less can help, saying “no” to preserve my unwillingness to be violated can help, funny memes can help, comedian Twitter can help (to a limit), some structure can help, meditation can help. But none of it can save me. I need a lot more help than that.

I think that it might start with not pretending to be what I’m not. (Which is why I want to run and hide in a hole when I see other people doing it–it taps into something deep within me that it took a lot of therapy and a lot of money to deal with; I can’t take others’ on too; I’m already tired.) With not pretending that this time is something it’s not, or is just one thing. Because there is no dark corner of myself or of this pandemic where grace does not go with me. Wherever I go, there I am–and there I AM is–the kind of saving grace that isn’t afraid of messy moods or bad haircuts or family drama because it is more with us when we are ourselves, and honest about it, than it ever could be–than we’d ever allow it to be–in our pretending.

My anxiety is a form of sensitivity that characterises much of my life, but here’s the thing–though it may be a bitch at 1 am or the LEGO table, it is a sensitivity that opens me up to things I never would have noticed without it. It leaves me raw and vulnerable, and it is often there–sometimes, only there–where the real magic happens. Where I, far from the captain’s deck and more in the bowels of the ship, collapsed in a heap–I am held, am made, am brought by grace to a place I never could have gotten to on my own.

• 

I’ve been getting into jazz.

I never used to like it, the meandering melodies and changing rhythms, the unpredictability of it all. But lately, life–like jazz–has been all over the place. And so have I. And maybe I’ve needed music that reflects that. So, every day before dinner, I pour a glass of wine, cue up my jazz station, and sit outside with no aim other than to sit still and watch…and listen.

I’ve also been reading. And that’s been all over the place as well: Anna Karenina, in preparation for the ballet that got cancelled; The Crucifixion, because I’m fun at parties; and Ben Folds’ memoir, A Dream about Lightning Bugs. In that one, Folds mentions a quote attributed to one of my new icons, Miles Davis, in regards to screwing up: “Once is a mistake, twice is jazz.” This is prior to a brilliant chapter about finding your voice.

Stay with me.

Remember how The Kid didn’t talk until he was four? And how now, he never shuts up? Yeah, he’s found his voice. He wakes well before the sun with words aplenty, spilling out of him, questions and answers, and continues his talk throughout the day, providing monologues on natural disasters and weather patterns, narrating catastrophes that befall the city he’s created out of blocks. Lately, he’s engaged in a fun new activity, wherein he–when told something is going to happen that he doesn’t like, ie brushing teeth or eating a vegetable (though let’s be honest, not much of the latter has been happening lately, #survivalmode), he lays down the law, always opening with an exasperated “SO.”

“SO. From now on we’re only going to do that once a day.” “SO. From now on, we’re not going to do that at all.” “SO. From now on I say what we do.” In his eight-year-old world, there is one way, and it’s his. And it would be funny, if it weren’t so annoying.

One way. One thing. I’m not a fan.

And in this time of quarantine, I’m being reminded why. We all want some predictability, a linear narrative that is defined by our own rules–control injected whenever possible–a narrative that ends right where we want it to. Discrete, definable patterns; reliable outcomes. We can’t control coronavirus, but we’ll be damned if we can’t control our personal narrative around it. Cue the social media blitz, photos and flowery memes.

A friend of mine, who has the audacity to always have an opinion (we’re alike in that way), went to a birthday party recently that–surprise–turned out to be a beach cleanup! The honouree enlisted everyone, once they arrived, to grab a provided bag and collect trash to fill it. How could anyone argue, as this was a good and selfless deed? Towards the end of the cleanup, the participants were enlisted again: for a group photo, to be shared on social media.

My friend said no. “But why?” she was questioned. “Come on, just take one photo!” they wheedled. And the kicker: “It’s for a good cause!”

She was having none of it. At the risk of being contrary and seen as difficult, but in seeking to preserve her sense of self, she reiterated her refusal. She didn’t want to be a pawn in this publicised good deed.

And there are so many people–the majority, I’d say–who would echo what her fellow trash collectors said: “Just do it! It’s only for a second! It’ll make everyone happy!” Which, I would argue, sounds a lot like the arguments heard prior to an assault.

I’ve been on the end of that form of compelling before–the social-pressure kind and the assault kind–and I’ve regrettably capitulated in both scenarios, donning a prop or participating in a photo-op or just doing whatever it was that would make someone else happy. Sometimes, this needs to be done. Sometimes, it’s a worthy sacrifice. (I am thinking, of course, of all the games of hide and seek I’ve played with my children, which manage to be both fun and tedious as hell. I am also talking about all the times I’ve had to wipe their asses.)

Sometimes, though, it’s manipulation and coercion. And oftentimes, lately, I’ve said no.

One of my favourite things about therapy has been finding out, as I sit on that couch, how often my reactions to situations are completely normal; it’s the situations themselves that are fucked up. And so often, those situations were engineered by someone with an agenda: a narrative to control. And so often, I was a pawn in that agenda.

Oh, trust me, I’m aware of how much of this I’ve perpetrated myself: narratives I determined to control, and people I’ve attempted to control in the process–in the process of trying to feel an iota of agency in the seeming absence of it. But lately, I’ve been finding my voice. And often, it is contained in one simple word: no.

NO to reducing this pandemic to one thing: one positive, or one negative, or one meme (although I’ll take the funny ones all day). NO to figuring out the meaning of it one month through and posting that meaning to social media in a pithy statement. NO to putting my chin up and being positive when doing so will not only be a lie compared to how depressed I’m feeling, but will threaten my mental health further. NO to interpretations of Easter that make it only a pastel parade of victory when we are so embedded in the “not yet” part of the story that we are in the middle of a global pandemic. NO to making it all just one thing when it’s so damn many of them.

In a thread recently, a friend wrote, “maybe all of our church holidays need to ache a little bit. We need to feel the tension of redeemed and waiting for all redemption.” At which point I applauded even as I realised what an unpopular, unsellable message this multifaceted, impossible-to-nail-down-with-one-label this kind of living is.

But it’s the only place where I come to life.

I have a friend–the kind who sticks closer than a brother–who, when I said to him via a video call the other day that “I guess I’m just a cynic,” shook his head. “You’re not a cynic,” he said. “There’s just no word yet for what you are.”

I know plenty of people who could think of a word. Contrary. Uncooperative. Unaccommodating. And those are the nice ones. But I’ve lived through the foolishness of trying to control my own narrative, and my life only really began when those efforts, and that narrative, fell apart to make way for the great mess of beauty that was waiting. So I’m not interested in being a bit player in someone else’s attempts.

Last weekend Andrea Bocelli exited the Duomo di Milano and sang “Amazing Grace,” repeating at the end the line, “I once was blind but now I see.” How about that! A blind man saying he can see? And there was a guy (I’m told he came back to life recently) who referred to himself as both peace and a sword. All over the place. Contradictions aplenty. Unpredictable and unwieldy and out of control. Like jazz.

One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began,

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice –

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

“Mend my life!”

each voice cried.

But you didn’t stop.

You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried

with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations –

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night,

and the road full of fallen

branches and stones.

But little by little,

as you left their voices behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice,

which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do

the only thing you could do –

determined to save

the only life you could save.

–Mary Oliver, “The Journey”

• 

I had a panic attack yesterday.

Isn’t that cute? That it wasn’t the bustle of New York or a move across the world that gave me my first full-on attack, but a few minutes of darting back and forth between The Kid, on his iPad doing a zoom session with his speech therapist, and Little Brother, doing LEGO at the kitchen table. Pulled one second toward TK to cast him a stern glance for not following his therapist’s instructions; pulled the next second by LB’s urges to help him find a piece, pulled apart within minutes by the greater fragmentation caused by this extraordinary time: my own identity overshadowed by the new ones I’ve had to assume, these roles of full-time third-grade teacher, full-time kindergarten teacher, full-time IT support for both classes as class parent.

So I fell apart. My throat constricted–my own personal hallmark of overwhelming anxiety, happens all the time–then the tightening moved to my chest, and within seconds I was struggling to breathe, wondering why my heart hurt so much, feeling like I was going to die. Right there among the LEGO. Like some kind of half-assed domestic martyr.

I put the kids on their iPads and told The Husband that I was going for a walk. I traveled around the block, and when I got home I received a text from a friend: had I read this book? Because she just had, and could loan it to me. I responded with something like, “I JUST GOT BACK FROM WALKING AROUND THE BLOCK TO FEND OFF A PANIC ATTACK SO YES THAT WOULD BE GREAT WHEN CAN YOU BRING IT.” Within minutes, the book was on my doorstep.

You can call that whatever you want to, but I call it grace.

Later, I put the boys in front of a movie (yes, there is a theme here and screens exist for a reason; USE THEM) and sat outside with a glass of wine and my phone, which was playing jazz. The time changed last weekend–it’s autumn here now–and, at nearly six, the sun was setting. I looked up at the backlit clouds and just stared. Their beauty leaves me with no other conclusion than that they have a Maker, though I’m not a fan of a lot of his other work right now, but then again I’m not at a high enough pay grade to receive all the current inter-office memos. So I just stared, and waited, and as the darkness grew around me, I cried.

I cried for things I haven’t fully grieved yet and likely never fully will: our church back in America, where our pastor, I had been told, just forwarded to everyone an article I wrote recently, attaching the message that he was still mad we’d left. I grieved for him and his wife, dear friends–the best, really–and for all the other people we’d left behind there, for the easy fellowship and deep vulnerability we’d experienced with them.

I cried for the grief my kids are experiencing but are unable to articulate, the loss of contact with teachers and friends, the spikes of boredom that are actually good for them but painful for all of us, for the fact they have to spend so much time out of their formative years navigating a global pandemic.

I cried for the suffering we’re all experiencing, for how damn hard this is, for what it’s doing to our hearts and minds that we’ll be dealing with for the rest of our lives (PEOPLE, GET A THERAPIST. IT COULD SAVE YOU.).

I cried for TH, who, when he married me, thought he was getting the “good” kind of crazy, the fun kind, but instead, these days, more often finds himself with the kind who is sitting outside curled into a nonfunctioning ball with tears running down her face, muttering something about takeout on the way because she just can’t.

I cried for my kids again, that they’re going to have memories of me sitting outside crying in a nonfunctional ball instead of sitting beside them watching a movie.

I cried. A lot. And then, somehow, I got up.

I ate the shit out of a cheeseburger and fries that someone else made. I finished my wine. I took a shower and got in bed.

I know that for those of you in the Northern hemisphere, the changing light–longer days of springtime–are a welcome arrival, maybe a symbol of hope. At least that’s how I’d spin it if I were up there where you are. For my part (and spinning), I’m finding relief in the shortened days, the earlier arrival of darkness that accompanies our hunkering down. Night is a gift right now, a rest from the forced “rest” of these days.

I’m finding relief in books showing up–both for me and our kids–on our doorstep. In chance meetings on the running trail with other mums I know, makeup-free and newly vulnerable about how hard this is. For unexpected, unscheduled talks about real shit for once. I’m finding relief in access to moments in my friends’ lives that I didn’t have before, in the kids playing Roblox with their friends over Zoom as their parents talk and live in the background, these parents of their friends who are my friends, these windows into their lives because of this shifting perspective, this season of change.

I’m finding relief in this worldwide newfound sense of collectivism, of taking care of others, not because I have the ability to take care of others beyond my four walls right now, but because I need to be taken care of, and people are doing that remotely and well. One set of footprints in the sand and all that.

I’m finding relief in really feeling my grief, in making space for my kids to feel theirs when they think, at bedtime, that they’re crying over Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban but they’re not, and I know that, and they can too.

I’m finding relief that, as the light and seasons and times shift and new pain is being exposed, that new mercies are too, and that unlike my own sanity and strength, these mercies never run out, never expire. I call that grace.