A few small things

I haven’t updated in a while, it’s true. Now I’m on Christmas break and reviewing the year, so it’s time to catch up.

1. The suit is gorgeous and makes me feel stylish, strong, and competent. A dear friend saw me in it and bought me a second suit, a charcoal herringbone, just to make me smile. So now I have a winter suit and a summer suit and I feel as though I can do anything.

2. I have two poems in the current issue of Screen Door Review. This is my first poetry publication credit (not counting the pay-to-play kids’ anthology I was in somewhere around eighth grade). I have been published in other ways—journalism, personal essay, reviews, interviews, literary criticism—but poetry is where I have made my creative home.

3. After a summer existing in a thin place, my winter has thickened up, senses dulled to evidence of divinity. I’m having trouble maintaining my connection to spirit. I’m also having trouble maintaining my connection to my body, which tends to happen this time of year anyway. I suspect the two are connected. But my dreams—those have become alarmingly vivid.

I read a book on grief rituals by Francis Weller and felt mixed feelings about it. Then I read a book on codependency by Cheryl Hetherington and liked it very much. Increasingly, however, I find books in the self-help genres are skilled at pinpointing and describing the nature of the problem, but fall down when it comes time to prescribe a remedy.

Then again, what is there to say? Be enough for yourself, as though some of us don’t need detailed examples. Set boundaries that recognize where you end and other people begin. Practice gratitude. Get out of your head and help others. All very good, but how much am I getting better, and how much am I trying not to be a nuisance? Buy a name-brand pacifier and stick it in your mouth. I’m looking for a different kind of quiet.

What have you been up to? Whose voices are you listening to, and what do you seek at the close of the year?