I have to laugh how I keep qualifying it. I have one printing job that has to be done, because Burning Man is important to other people. But it's bandanas, which aren't too hard to print, and Dave doesn't care what inks I use or even whether they are great quality, because he's giving them away to other Burners...so I can do that. Then there's that collection of clown clothes for Saturday...I have most of it already in a box, so dropping that off at the office won't be a big chore. Except it's the office...where I even have a shelf, as well as many empty ones awaiting my archiving. So maybe I could work on archives, because that is fun...and I can pick up some beer on the way home from dropping off the clown clothes.
And drying tomatoes and making apple-pear sauce isn't really work, it just has to be done now or it wastes the free food my trees give me. If I prune them. So maybe I'll finish up the summer pruning. It's not really work because I like to do it. And I get mulch.
Then there's the painting...I have parts of both houses that need to be dealt with. There's no time like summer to do those projects, and again, I enjoy that. Mostly. What I enjoy is having uninterrupted space and time to do them in, so this week fits that bill.
And obligations, well, there are the friends and neighbors I am neglecting, always using the excuse of too much work to do. So when I eliminate the work pressure, there goes my excuse. So, some hanging out? No, I don't want to have to talk to anyone. Hermit week!
I want to stay offline. Facebook makes me anxious as much as it gives me some pleasure now and then. Maybe I can check it but just not comment. A few "likes" could maybe be painless. Perhaps once a day or so, with maybe a couple of days when I pretend the internet doesn't exist. Unless I have to look up something like how to remove shingles without shredding the whole wall. Or where to get parts for whatever I decide to fix from my endless list. So maybe I have to visit Jerry's or some other place to buy things. Or maybe I just do what I can do without driving anywhere.
And then suppose I got some acupuncture for my foot or my arm or my general sense of well-being? I could fit that in. Or make an appointment for next week. I'm supposed to be getting a bone scan, so I guess I could make that call. But hermits don't use the phone, so scratch that. Texting with my son? Always okay, even for hermit week.
I will call my Mom, of course, at 1:00 as I do every Sunday, but that is going to be it for today. Do I keep the phone on as I told my greiving neighbor I would? Yes, I guess I do. So maybe the week of chosen obligations. I choose all my obligations, really. Sometimes the reasons are a bit obscure.
Will I cut some branches off some trees perhaps? I would've, if a squirrel nest hadn't landed in the middle of the street yesterday. I found it on my way home, and quickly thought it would not be good for my neighbor to find it, so I picked it up and moved it onto my property. But the babies, mostly still alive, were not going to be creatures whose lives I took responsiblity for beyond moving them to safety. Yes, I love animals, but another batch of squirrels to eat my pears and apples before I can get to them? Perhaps nature would take care of them. I wondered if the mother might rescue them like a cat would. Though full of dread I looked this morning and all of them were gone, the living and the ones who looked dead yesterday. Cleanly gone. Nature might have done it, the mother squirrel or a raccoon or possum or other predator. I did a little.
I'm grieving too, for my neighbor who suffered a painful end to his life, but it's a strange grief I need to explore in solitude. I've been crying at odd things. Hearing that JJ's husband stood there at the corner of the info booth all day just in case she was in danger still makes me weep. Romantic love songs make me think of my son celebrating a six-month anniversary of a lover...six months. Ahhh. The limerence is high, they seem grounded, but he's the age I was in 1979, and oh, so many love things happened in the last 40 years. I cry to think about his heartbreaks, cry to think about his joy.
I want to have some euphoria and joy in my hermit week, and I do love solitude and every time the bushtit flock lands on the suet, fifteen at a time, I get a thrill. My backyard birds and plants are possibly enough wilderness for me, but maybe I could motivate to go weep by the ocean or take a hike. If there wouldn't be any people...but people can be so good and kind and inspiring. The Banana Block in Portland...clowns in the face of terror...I can love people. Lots of them, actually.
So maybe only a few hermit days will suffice. Hard to know until I sink in. It's okay to not drop every little thing, so qualifying isn't a crime. I can aspire to hermit week. Maybe certain special people would actually improve hermit week...it's possible. I can be open to it. I can be open.
Open and closed all at once, joy and sorrow, grief and love. That's where I operate best, on that tightrope. Feeling that divine tension.
Call me next week, and I might answer. Leave a message. Hug someone, to make up for me running away. I'll be back next Saturday at Market, because. Love you!
