Braying and the Paint-Water

Tuesday, March 24, 2020

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We’re not doing anything, but everything feels too hard.

It feels too hard to sit in the house. It feels too hard to not go to the store or out to dinner or to a friend’s house. It feels too hard to not do anything. Aidan says he’s even tired of petting the cat.

So we ate lunch.

Why don’t dogs eat lunch?, he says as he pops a tasty morsel into his mouth and rolls it around. I say nothing. It’s too profound to think about. It’s too hard.

We did leg exercises during his work breaks and I cleaned the shit out of the floors. I even steam cleaned them with my little hardwood steam cleaner. Sparkle-Sparkle-Time.

I was poking around in the fridge for no particular reason. Finding nothing interesting, I closed the fridge door. Aidan popped out from behind it. “RAARRRR!” He said. I screamed like I was twelve and almost fell over.

He doubled over laughing. Laughing so hard he ended up braying like a donkey. Laughing at his laughing, I laughed until tears gathered in my eyes and everything went blurry. He hugged me and twirled me around. I-GOT-YOU-I-GOT-YOU!

We painted for a while and I watched the paint swirl from my brush into my little water cup. The greens mixed with blues and then whites and then yellows and then browns until it was all a murky mess.

Miss G. meowed at me and walked across the table With Purpose. She glared at me and drank some of my paint-water. I shooed her away and cleaned her cat box and went back to painting. She hopped up and drank some more murky-yucky-water, glaring. I shooed her off the table and gave her a little nibby-snack in the kitchen. Here she came again.

What-do-you-want?, I asked her. I picked her up and smooshed her against me, dancing around the room. I showed her the view out the kitchen window. She purred. I danced her around the living room. She made biscuits on my shoulder. I danced her around the bedroom and sang her a little song. She made sweet love eyes at me and smiled.

Sitting and waiting and wondering who, of those we know, will die…that’s too hard. Thinking of all the things is too hard. Wondering what we touched that is still contaminated is too hard. Feeling trapped and the house is stuffy and smells like various cleaning solutions and cooking dinner all seem just.too.hard.

But it turns out that loving is so easy. Forgiveness and time spent well and laughing when my husband scares me from behind the fridge is so easy. Loving on the animals who don’t really want paint-water, they just want to snuggle…is so easy.

It’s hard to figure out how to feel. It’s hard to forgive myself for feeling happy sometimes. It’s hard to feel like any of this is really happening at all. It’s hard to find so much joy and sorrow all swirled together like my little paint-water-cup. It’s so easy and it’s so hard and it’s all just so murky.