Painting at midnight, pancakes at dawn

See last post: what I am doing?

By streetlight at 11pm I am painting the first side of a door purchased this afternoon at a second-hand store, so that in the morning I may measure, saw it in half, then paint the remainder of the bottom and hang it upstairs for a top-open door to Felix's room. By the early rays of sunrise I am peeling and shredding a butternut squash to mix with eight eggs and perhaps 4/3 cup coconut flakes for pancakes. At noon LL and I are pulling dandelions in the slab of concrete in our yard, to fill the cracks in with drought-hardy perennials, and also, along the edges, raised beds of kale, strawberries, and a few valiant shoots of broccoli. This all while trying to chase after Felix and Sam, read a (worthwhile) book called "No-Drama Discipline" and apply it as much as possible, stay up to date on CME, and slowly increase our clinic encounter numbers. In other words: staying busy, yes, and anything I may be doing pales beside LL, who is doing all of this while actually directly providing the bulk of Sam's calories.

And yet. Mentally, I am infusing this busy-ness with an urgency it does not always merit. In so doing I am often doing more at a time than is necessary, doing something that may not be the most needed action at the time, and/or not giving myself adequate pauses, breaths, such that the few times I do get a "break", I quickly rush to fill that void with activity that is not always restorative.

Keeping such a schedule becomes a form of what Naomi Klein calls "looking away." She is referring, in her intro to "This Changes Everything", of looking away from the full and terrifying impacts of climate change and, inseparably, the full and terrifying impacts of unfettered capitalism. And this looking away has the ultimate effect of curtailing the creativity that is so needed right now to fix our world. By pouring my every attention into each painted corner, each perfectly grilled pancake, each word of praise or redirection for the boys, and yes, each doctor-patient encounter, I am denying myself the time and space needed to imagine a truly better world.

And in case you noticed: yes, I'm also taking all this WAY too seriously! Part of the delicious paradox of the entire situation is that I need to lighten up, sleep more, care less--at least about details--and enjoy life. Only as such can I or any of us be the change we wish to see. Hey! At least I'm a day early on this post! There's still another whole day of June! Yay! To bed! :)