Week 24
View from the houseboats
I’m torn between detailing the news I am most outraged by this week (e.g. violence against Black and Jewish individuals and communities) and fear of inflicting information on the unsuspecting who might currently avoiding the news in acts of self-preservation. The reasons for fear, anxiety and depression are myriad (a friend sent a great flow chart of reasons to be grumpy in California right now). And yet there are many moments of joy to be found and, in time, motivation to take action to change the world.
Theo is home from school this week (they are planning for the “new” school year) so it’s been a reminder of how tricky this balancing act of work and entertaining the kiddo is. Theo has sat under my desk for multiple meetings. My mother has done some very long virtual puppet shows with Theo.
Gratitude & appreciation
Monday morning Theo and I made sloth cards together (I glued my fingers together). In the afternoon giving it to our neighbor led to a chain of delightful events, including my first sail in 10? years (my neighbor let me figure it out and just helped out a bit as needed); meanwhile Theo rode around on my neighbor’s inflatable motorboat.
We bought a (refurbished) Dyson vacuum. I cannot tell you how excited we were when it arrived, or how much pet hair we have vacuumed up since.
I invested in two small pieces of art from local artists.
We’ve done all our exercise inside putting our bikes on the trainer this week because of the smoke – makes me very glad we invested in it awhile ago.
I made fig and prosciutto pizza for dinner one night and Theo and I made a blueberry pie another day.
(Re)Learnings and observations
Create supportive structures: One of the important outcomes of date hike Wednesday was realizing the daily house rhythms were not facilitating my spouse’s self-care. So we have been experimenting with dinner meal planning (to reduce daily decision fatigue), blocking off time in the calendar to plan meals (and maybe camping) together, and implementing family journaling after dinner and before bath time, and family meditation before bed. Family journaling has been the biggest success, followed by
Simplifying: You know there are a thousand things I wanted to do this week. Yet simply by making the below list of top-priority items I feel more accomplished. Also, its giving me some insight into why mentors feel overwhelmed if I tell them all the things I’m doing – they really don’t want to know – they only want to know the absolute most important things to me, or about the things they are involved in and helping me with. It’s a little like qualitative research (which I’ve been struggling in this week). There are a thousand little interesting things happening – but a few overriding themes that encompass those details.
Actions to support Black and other people of color: Finished reading Raisin in the Sun. Started reading 12 Years a Slave. Read this great interview with Angela Davis by Ava Duvernay. Reached out to colleagues after the latest horrific murder. Looking forward to last week’s rescheduled meeting (due to fires) about supporting the pipeline of potential Black scientists. Honestly, nothing feels like enough. Planning to call some representatives today.
As in past weeks, I invite you to report in on your wellbeing, share your goal of a tiny step towards a passion project (and perhaps a second goal of a collaboration) and report in on your progress from last week's goals.
Thinking of you and hoping you and your loved ones stay healthy and safe.
Krista