Not gonna lie to you, my friends, I got bupkis up in this blog-brain o’mine. Besides the fact that I’m amazed that Saturday is here again, I’m not unaware that it comes around regularly. And yet, a week passing like a blink is still a bit surprising. A week in which stuff happened, sure. A good week. A fine week. Not without its issues. I could easily flip on my outrage around mentally unhinged and unattended young men with access to high-powered firearms who kill. The sadly not-surprising, yet necessarily ongoing conversation around racism, which two weeks ago brought the lens in on the violence against the AAPI community that ramped to nuclear in 2020 after 45 and his minions used (&used&used&used) hateful, bullying, deadly language as a tag around the global pandemic. I could definitely wax on regarding that, yet instead I’m including this link for folks to find and explore ways to help channel their outrage. Within that same tragedy, the issue of women and sexuality. The undeniable fetishization of Asian women and the marginalization inside of that topic. (Great essay on that here.) The fact that in my frustration this week with the seeming impossibility that there is no meaningful movement around gun-control issues up on that hill called Congress, that I fantasized about reaching out to my fangirl fave Ella Emhoff to discuss bulletproof knitwear for trips out of the house. Sure, I could go on about all that. But instead I’m going with the joy of meh…it was a week.
From last Saturday to this, I wandered around the neighborhood and made up stories about all the people who used to be connected to the masks & one glove (above) I found scattered here and there, indications of the times we live in. I made a lot of appointments for people to get vaccines so that those masks & one glove will signify a time past (though not anytime soon, people. Herd immunity. say it with me). I talked to a few of my very favorite people via phone, Zoom, and FaceTime. I finished an amazing, darkly humored, deeply insightful, hugely entertaining fiction, We Play Ourselves, by Jen Silverman about what happens when your sense of self feels on the verge of nothing, but then you dig deeper and find a lot of something. Watched the Sound of Metal in which nothing becomes a soundtrack and accepting that moves along every emotional track imaginable. Watched a short series, The Night Manager, which is nothing to write home about but does feature the Awesome (capital A) Olivia Colman. I spent time petting Gladimus the Great (formerly known as Gladys. Name changed on account of gender discovery), who one day slipped past my legs and into our apartment, then upon finding nothing resembling endless containers of kibble or cabinets of cat toys, glanced at me with cat-size disappointment, stepped back out, and carried on with chasing butterflies.
I’ve been sitting in nothing twice a day for two-years-plus. Perched on a little stool on a cushion. I say sitting rather than meditating because although the aim is in fact to meditate, often I’m really just sitting. Attempting nothing. Boy that’s a challenge. The first flush is a deep breath of aaahhh, just releasing all thought. Sitting on the bank of my mind letting thoughts go by until wait, what’s that sound? A song. out a window. of a car. wow. that was a hit in my first NYC summer. Rolling Rock. loved those bottles. and my phoenicia t-shirt. where’d that go? i want that t-shirt again. must look online… and then I’m paddling that raft down thought river until I spot a waterfall and pull myself to shore to start again. Nothing. the feel of my breath under my nose, rise and fall. nothing. did I respond to that person about her vaccine appointment? gotta do that. the word vaccine comes from the latin vacca (cow)? so weird. that podcast was cool. … WAIT. STOP. You see where I’m going here. Nothing is difficult. But the trying is so very worth it. There’s no doubt at all that from my time sitting I’m a lot more okay with the nothings, the unknowns, the uncertainties of stuff, the realization I don’t really know and fine, so I’ll wait. It’s possible (okay, yes, true) that I thought up some of the things written here while I was sitting attempting nothing this morning. But starting again. That’s a thing. I did that then and I’ll keep swimming toward it. Nothing like the present. Til next week. May your nothings be filled with exactly what you need.
Does This Make Me Look 