Love

One of my dear friends used to say, “when you’re going through hell, keep going,” but he’s dead now, so what does he know. I feel certain if there is any great place to be after death, he’s there, and he’s drunk most of the day.

Another of my dear friends, her father died a month ago. Then her mother was diagnosed with cancer. It’s just hard to pace all the mournful let’s drink as much as we want to events, especially when we don’t want to drink that much anymore.

And it’s so dark outside.

Well: at the mom-has-cancer, we got one round of drinks that was so strong, one of us approached the bar for a weakening agent. It was a tiki bar, though, and it was a Painkiller, which is a thing I’ve never ordered, because I like tiki drinks, but I also like walking under my own power.

Drinking after the mom cancer diagnosis left me with two slices of late night pizza for the following day’s lunch.

Drinking after the election of a fascist, racist, sexist, homophobic Nazi-loving felon who only ran to avoid prison time left me with 1/8 can Pringles, which I unexpectedly enjoyed, and a long run of chocolate that I used to great effect.

We’re three weeks in, and I saw that one acquaintance who was trans took her own life. She was such a wildly interesting person. Came to one of my art-making sessions, at random, in public.

But I understand lawmakers in the federal capitol are actually spending time worrying about where other people pee and what they have or don’t have or used to have in their private area.

When the barista finished my coffee (drink): a mocha at the only place I trust mochas, where they are slightly chocolatey but not candy, and when she set it down, I said, “Life is so terrible, and this coffee is so beautiful,” and she said, “It is terrible, but we’ll get through it together.”

For the record: I think people voted for DT because they are terrified. Which isn’t okay. You can’t do destructive things just because you’re afraid.

I think they were terrified by covid (who wasn’t?), and can’t accept that it even happened, that a million people died, that we were isolated for months and months and missed Christmas.

And I think when people are terrified of women and people who aren’t white and covid, they will elect a Strong Man, a fascist. It happened in Germany. It has happened here, in a similar pattern.

I’m trying to think I did what I could.

Of course I’m scared, too, all the time.

We drank our tiki drinks until one in our party said of the cool-looking wheelchair parked in the aisle, I want to take that thing for a spin.

I tell you one thing, I love to entertain. I love to have my friends come to me. I love to think about what they would enjoy, think about lighting, pillows and blankets. I love having a couch anyone I know can comfortably sleep on. I love having cats who will snuggle anyone who desires snuggle.

I love living walking distance from friends so it doesn’t matter when or if they leave.

I love walking with friends in my neighborhood. It is one of life’s great pleasures.

I love that my student who failed to pick up his head for my Thoreau lesson came by and gave me a hug before Thanksgiving break.

I love that I have coworkers who wear sequins to work during spirit week, and I love that at our school, only the staff participate, and the kids look us over and roll their eyes and shake their heads.

I love the tree in my front yard that goes fiery red, even in a dry year, and keeps going.

I love that New York City still does everything it does, even without me.

I love that one of my cats has the middle name of a dead friend.

I love how many seasons of “Grey’s Anatomy” there are, and how emotionally un-triggering its soapiness is.

I love the proud mediocrity of “The Guilded Age” Season 1, though indeed Season 2 is much better.

I love our new class fish, Mike Wyzowski, and I love how his name is spelled.

I love those scenes in “Yellow Submarine” where the NOs get squashed into YESes.