Life Wish #14: Let the world turn without you tonight

Hello my friends and happy it’s-no-longer-the-Trump era to you! I have been sleeping a little bit better and hope you are, too — apparently that is what Sleepy Joe meant the whole time?! Who knew?

For me, gotta say, the weeks between Christmas and the inauguration were not great. My body and mind were able to hold it together just long enough to get to some time off work, then the dam broke, and my whole host of chronic physical and emotional pains all flared up at once.

It was bad, and then on January 6th, it got worse. Like a lot of people who had chaotic, abusive childhoods, the whole storming-of-the-Capitol bullshit stirred up a bunch of old oh-no-the-adults-have-no-idea-what-they-are-doing feelings in me, and it’s only been the last week or so that my system has been able to relax.

Part of that is having a new administration, for sure, full of people who take their jobs seriously and intend to do them well. It helps so much just to know there are competent hands on the wheel, even though it will take some time to turn this boat around and also realizing that they will need to be continually pushed on the scale of changes they’re willing to make.

The other part is me making a real effort to focus on the most basic basics of my physical and mental health: going to bed at a decent hour, eating regularly, and moving my body every day I can manage it. Cause when I stay up till 3 am letting YouTube autoplay me neverending clips of The Office while banging away at my favorite cute phone video game, or when I put off eating till it’s a problem, or ignore my body’s desire to stretch and dance, it’s hard to feel good enough to do anything but lie on a heating pad and scroll.

There is such an addictive quality to communal stress and outrage, and it takes a big effort to pull my attention out of the mayhem and put it on something more regenerative or at least fun. By supporting my very basic human needs — bed by midnight! regular meals instead of random snacking! do even the tiniest bit of exercise — I’m trying to let my body and mind and spirit know that they are safe, they are taken care of, and it’s okay to relax a bit.

How have you been holding up during all of this? Are you doing okay at the basic basics? Sleeping any better in the last week? I sure hope so. We’ve been in a heightened state for a long time, and it’s not like everything is all better (oh God if only!) … but I hoping we can all find ways to give ourselves good regenerative breaks as we march on through this very Long Winter. More about that next week!

Until then, I wish you long, decadent stretches of magically restorative sleep,

Madgey

Some links!

• This Costa Rica birdcam is the best TV I have watched in years. I laughed! I cried! I was transfixed!

• The White Pages by Garrett Bucks, a white anti-racism activist in Wisconsin, is one of my favorite newsies. He writes beautifully, holding space for both where we are and where we must go.

• Do you watch Grand Designs? It’s a British TV show that follows people doing massive home-building projects, for years sometimes, and I find it riveting. Usually it’s a couple and one of them is super obsessed and the other one is trying not to roll their eyes 24/7 while living in a caravan for years on end. I love seeing the ups and downs and how people respond to the inevitable obstacles and also what their projects look like at the end. There’s a few seasons on Netflix and a bunch on YouTube as well.

• Really been enjoying my local Buy Nothing group lately — how fun to have people show up at your house and take away stuff that you don’t want anymore! And/or to get free stuff from neighbors! Check the linked website or just search Buy Nothing on Facebook to find your neighborhood group — they are pretty much everywhere!

• Some songs I have been obsessed with lately: “Kyoto” by my daughter Phoebe Bridgers, DJ Amorphous’s “Never Kissed It Too Much” (a Rihanna/Luther Vandross mashup), and “Nada” by Lido Pimienta.