People can change

More than 20 years ago, my high school gym class went out to the track after a heavy rainstorm. The oval was littered with earthworms, stranded by the storm. It was nearly impossible to find a place to put our feet without stepping on one of them.

My squeamish teenage self freaked out. Yuck. Worms. I couldn’t imagine touching them, feeling them wriggle in my hand.

Fast forward to today.

A few years ago I bought a Can-O-Worms vermicomposting system. Now that we live in a small condo, my worm farm lives in the shower in our guest bathroom. Just before Thanksgiving I ordered a Soil Sifter Pail Buddy to make processing the compost easier.

Yesterday I assembled the Pail Buddy, and tonight I sat in the bathroom, up to my wrists in compost, casually tossing red wigglers back into the Can-O-Worms trays.

And then I remembered high school gym class.

When I wrote a few days ago about being discouraged, I was mostly talking about being discouraged about myself. About living with my personality, my quirks, my shortcomings. About things I’d like to change about myself. Changes that seem impossible.

I don’t know how that squeamish teenager became a carefree worm farmer. It was a gradual, unconscious change.

I get discouraged every time another of my self-improvement schemes fall flat. But sometimes, when I step back and look at the big picture, I can see the good changes I’ve made.

At this time of year, when the days are short, I need that big picture view.

Even if it’s just that I’m no longer afraid of worms.

Patiently and persistently

At last summer’s writing workshop in the Wrangell Mountains, one of the leaders recounted  a story about a Buddhist retreat she’d attended.

She lowered her voice to mimic the deeper tones of the Buddhist monk leading the retreat.  ”Patiently and persistently.  Persistently and patiently.  Patiently and persistently.”

She brought us back to those words throughout our workshop.  At early morning writers’ circle. Patiently and persistently. During free-writes at the Root Glacier.  Persistently and patiently. As she wandered among us late in the week, while each of us scribbled or typed frantically to finish our work.  Patiently and persistently.

This afternoon Brady and I stopped by the hangar to show Liesl the Christmas wreath we’d purchased at the Girdwood Holiday Bazaar.  The snow outside the hangar was deep and slushy, half-way up the car’s wheels. When I headed home, I thought the Subaru might get stuck.

Gently and slowly, I told myself.  Slowly and gently.  I heard the echo: patiently and persistently, persistently and patiently.

Slowly, gently, patiently, persistently I depressed the gas pedal. Applying consistent, steady pressure, I didn’t get stuck, not even in the uphill, car-swallowing slush pits on Mt. Hood Drive.

I can do it.  Yes, I can.  Slowly and gently, patiently and persistently, I can do it.

 

A rose in the wintertime

Tonight I feel profoundly discouraged.

My life stretches out in front of me, never different, never better, just longer.

Sometimes colliding events steal the joy of living. Tonight disappointment swirls into biochemistry and the increasing darkness of early winter. Snow and freezing rain coat the Seward Highway from Girdwood to Anchorage, pushing my driving phobia into panic mode, cutting me off from UU friends in town.

During this first part of Alaskan winter, when each day get darker and shorter, the walls close in, and “hope is hard to find” (as the song says).

Then winter solstice comes, a misleading moment of joy in the return of the light.

There’s still a lot more winter on the other side of solstice. Yes, there’s more light every day, and increasing energy comes with more light. But snow and ice keep building, and we don’t see anything green and growing until mid-to-late May. In their own way, the long months of lingering winter after solstice are just as dispiriting as the darkening days before solstice.

People who have never lived in Alaska often ask us, “How can you stand the winters?”

I have a stock answer––I talk about having hobbies, staying busy, getting outdoors when the sun’s out.

But there’s a deeper answer. Winter teaches perseverance. It teaches the hard-won skills of endurance and persistence, of doing what you don’t feel like doing, because the alternative feels worse.

So on nights like tonight, I move the laundry along, pay the bills, and take Brady with me on a short walk across the street to the post office. I write a post like this one, to get the toxic feelings out of my system, and I make dinner for Liesl and me.

I don’t feel like doing any of those things. I’d rather just curl up under a blanket in the dark. But I know from long experience that the blanket is false comfort. Sometimes you just have to grit your teeth, and keep moving, keep doing the right thing.

There’s also some self-nurture involved in surviving Alaskan winters. We’ll probably watch a movie tonight, one that will take me out of myself, distracting me until the mood passes.

And it will pass. That’s the lesson of the turning wheel of Alaskan seasons. Long as the winters are, spring does come, and glorious summer, full of light and Sitka roses.

Photo by Gretchen Fitzenrider.

Obstacles and opportunities

I’ve been having a pie crust problem lately. No, it’s not the calories. It’s not even the Crisco/butter/lard dilemma.

It’s the quantities. It used to be that a cup of flour and 1/3 cup fat was enough for a single-crust pie, and double that made a two-crust pie.

It’s not working out that way anymore. Every pie I make, I run out of dough, and find myself patching and hoping and making do. I suspect it’s the flour.

Happened again the day before Thanksgiving.

I planned to make an apple pie and a pumpkin pie. Three cups flour, one cup fat. Made enough for two crusts. One for the pumpkin––great.  But what about my planned two-crust apple pie?

I took a poll, and making a streusel topping won out over making more pie crust. 

I have two streusel recipes–one calls for oats, and one doesn’t. I couldn’t find either one of them.

Frustrated, I reached for How to Cook Everything––and discovered that Mark Bittman’s streusel recipe calls for pecans! Yum! Brilliant.

The apple pie was amazing. Sure, it would have been delicious with a plain crust, too. But without running into obstacles with the crust and the missing streusel recipes, we would not have had such a special, festive pie.

 

Decaf blogger

A few days ago, my blogging silence prompted an inquiry from Tele over on Hooked.  “You doing okay up there, Heather? Seems like it’s been a while.”

Doing just fine, Tele. Thanks for asking.

Here’s the deal. We’re doing some detox at our house, some serious get-healthy work. I’ve figured out how to cook beans. We’re eating kale and chard. We’re having meat-free meals several times a week.

And I’ve gone completely decaffeinated.

Guess what?  Turns out full-test coffee is an important part of my writing process.  Without it I feel calmer–which was the point of this exercise–but I also feel less driven, less motivated, less focused.

This is most likely a temporary problem, something that will go away once my adrenal system finds its way back to equilibrium.

But in the meantime, I’m not feeling particularly inspired. It doesn’t help that this time of year in Alaska, my chi flows like cold molasses. We get snow about every other day. The sun comes up later every day, and goes down earlier.

I’m at the hangar tonight with Liesl and Brady, writing this post and fetching things for Liesl. I cleaned snow off the horizontal of one of the airplanes outside, so it doesn’t get too tail-heavy. Liesl brought some maintenance books from home, and I stashed them on the bookcase in the back of the hangar.

Brady and I went outside for a while and played snowballs, one of his favorite activities. Now that we’re back inside, he’s running between Liesl and me. Liesl’s more interesting, because she’s vacuuming out one of the airplanes.

And that’s my decaf life. Not terribly exciting, but good anyway.

Thanks again for asking, Tele.