Dear ones, I don’t know what to say about the U.S. bombing Iran. I wish I did; I just don’t know enough about the situation to feel like I can say much of anything that’s likely to be informative or helpful.
I feel like someone in a therapist’s office, stuck and wordless, and the therapist gently says, “Let’s start with feelings. How do you feel right now?”
Sad. Frustrated.
A little scared for me and mine.
Very scared for all the people who have already been hurt or killed by this, and for all those much more likely to be at risk than I am.
Angry. Exhausted.
Mostly sad.
Tomorrow, I head up to Racine to teach for a week at a novel-in-progress workshop. I’ll take a little handwork with me, for when I can’t think, or don’t want to think.
These days, I don’t really want to think, most of the time.
I’m not sure any of us really have that luxury right now.
My plan had been to use this week to kickstart some summer writing — teach in the mornings, write in the afternoons. Or get up early and write before teaching. Or write in the evenings. Or all of the above. I have about two months before I have to think about UIC fall teaching again, and if I don’t accomplish anything substantive writing-wise in those two months, I’m going to be mad at myself.
I wasn’t sure which project I was going to work on, but I was seriously considering either revising the SF novel about fighting back against an oppressive government bent on controlling or destroying you, or doing one final (?) pass on the SF novel about standing up to domineering conservative relatives, or re-starting drafting the epic fantasy war novel set in ancient Sri Lanka…
Today, just the thought of any of those books exhausts me.
Maybe I’ll go back to the food essays instead. Food is connection, is history, is community, is grief, is love. Or I could start drafting the perennial garden book, taking all of my notes over the years and trying to build something beautiful and useful out of them.
Or maybe I will write that ancient Sri Lankan fantasy novel, but instead of writing about two kings battling it out for ego and power (gah.), I will write about the palace cook. Her story is probably a lot more interesting than theirs, and I’ll get to include some recipes too. Maybe she’ll fall in love with the head gardener, and by the end of the novel, readers will have picked up some useful tips for feeding dozes of people and building a productive perennial garden.
I don’t want to think about all the ugly destructive things that I don’t know if I have any chance of affecting, if I even knew where to start.
I want to stop thinking about destroying things, and think about building things instead. Menus. Gardens. Dinner parties. Communities. Nations. With liberty and justice and kindness and generosity for all.
Here is a picture of some earrings that someone made in my workshop yesterday. For twenty minutes, it made her so happy.
Me too.
