Maybe You Can

Gesticulating Like A Windsock

A Note For You, If You’re Have A Bad Day

My Dear Friend,

I’m trying to remember what prompted me to write about what it would take to have a perfect day. 

Well, I'd decided that what I needed was to journal. 

I’m putting a lot of my old art in this post. It’s nevertheless all mine.

But what was I supposed to journal about? This was less clear. I scratched around at the top of the page for a little while, letting myself think that this was not a waste of time. (I would have told you that it wasn’t a waste of time.)

When I’m not in a journaling mood, I make lists. Lists of things to do, see, read. Lists of names I like if I were to get a rabbit (don’t worry, I’m not getting one), lists of lists I’d like to make in the future, lists of ideas for cartoons or for not-cartoons.

After writing a long list of things I wished I was doing instead of writing in my journal, I wrote this: “Let’s design A PERFECT DAY. I can’t have that, because I have a job. But I can DESIGN IT.”

And I designed it. Here is a photograph of its design. (My daughter scribbled on it, as she does all things I leave open anywhere in the universe. I have nothing that matters to me that is unscribbled-upon, and I’ve realized how much I love living this way. The property values of many of the surfaces of my home have diminished, but the joy I feel when I realize that there are little piles of purple spaghetti scrabbled against a formerly boring back door makes it feel worth it.)

After I designed this day, I realized that it really didn’t seem that impossible — especially in the week before I was supposed to start my new job. “I’m going to go for it,” I wrote. “Maybe Thursday.” And I decided right then that I was going to have the day, and I would tell you everything about the day, and if I told myself I was going to tell you about it, I would have to do it. You didn’t know you were going to hold me accountable, but you were. And you did. 

Because here I am, telling you what I learned.

First, I’ll cut to the chase: it mostly worked out! It didn’t totally work out. I learned some things. I have emerged on the other side, and I know things now I didn’t know before. Let’s go line by line.

[1]

5:30 - WAKE UP. The coffee is already brewing.

• Get a cup of coffee and head to my pink chair.

• Write my page-a-day.

• Hand write some initial out of bed thoughts.

• Spend some cozy time with the novel.

SCORE: 10/100

I did my page-a-day, but nothing else worked out, because my daughter, T, also woke up at 5:30. You can’t do anything you want to do at 5:30 when your one-and-a-half-year-old is also awake. The coffee was not already brewing because our coffee machine doesn’t work that way (I keep trying to get it to, but it won’t). I did no morning writing, and I haven’t done any in six months. Every day that I wake up in the morning at 5:30, T senses it. It’s like she smells me. She wakes up the minute I wake up no matter what. I may need to sacrifice my dream of morning writing until she is a teenager.

[2]

6:20: WALK TO PRAYER PORCH

• Pray.

• Come home. Brush my teeth.

• Hug T.

SCORE: 60/100

I couldn’t walk to Prayer Porch, but I knew I wasn’t going to be able to, because again: toddler. I went to it over Zoom, and it was nice. I hadn’t been in months. I didn’t know how much I’d missed it. I prayed for my friend who was in the hospital and I sobbed; I read poetry, I listened to poetry, my friend Peggy scolded my for failing to pray, I laughed. I was with people I loved. I promised that I’d go back. (I did.)

I did brush my teeth. I did hug my daughter. 

[3]

7:00: GARDEN.

• Sing to the chickens.

• Munch on greens.

• Tidy around the house.

SCORE: 90/100

I want to tell you I sang to the chickens, but I chickened out. (I almost didn’t write that sentence, because it’s awful, but I had to write it. Someone in Writing Heaven would have been so disappointed in me for squandering that.) I ate greens and I lightly gardened and tidied for a while, and this was gentle and easy. I like to see the chickens in the morning, and count them, and say hello to each of them by name. 

[4]

8:00: YOGA, RUNNING, SHOWER.

SCORE: 100/100

I had not gone running in a long time, so I have to give myself a perfect score just for fucking doing each of these things at all.

[5]

9:00: BREAKFAST.

• Eat a yummy breakfast with eggs, tortillas, (Sky’s) chili crisp, and loads of greens. Do the crossword puzzle. Have water.

SCORE: 100/100 

See photographic evidence.

[6]

9:30: SIT DOWN FOR A LONG CHUNK OF WRITING.

• Write & write & write & write & only take little breaks to look at flowers.

SCORE: 98/100

When I am really honest, the thing I want to do most in the world is sit down with a piece of writing that I am writing because I love writing it. That’s why I loved graduate school so much, and why I’m not always sure whether or not to advise people to pursue MFAs. I am not sure an MFA does anything for you career-wise. However, if I were going to design a two-year THING TO DO, it would just be my MFA program. Amazing writers give you activities to do? And they are writing activities? And then THEY READ THEM!? And OCCASIONALLY THERE ARE COMICS!?!?!??! I really couldn’t think of anything more fun. But if that doesn’t sound like the most fun thing that you could possibly do, then ??? I don’t know ??? On the other hand, I did have time to write my first book during grad school. When else does one find this time? Well, if you don’t have a baby, you could find the time at 5:30 in the morning, say the people who are against grad programs. I can see all angles, basically.

I give myself a 98 because while I did spend all three hours writing, and I did take one break to look at the yellow flowers (which have given me nonstop joy all summer), I did a little more editing than I would have liked. I returned to a piece about not breastfeeding that I wanted to revisit. A perfect 100 would have been less editing, more exploring into the vast open sea of new ideas. Really, maybe I’m being too generous with myself, but isn’t that the whole thing about this newsletter?

[7]

12:00: STOP WRITING

• Have a simple salad involving greens from the garden & vegan mozzarella & fruit in season & lemon & oil.

SCORE: 95/100

There was no fruit. The salad was still the food of dreams.

[8]

1:00: WALK TO THE LAKE

• And get in it.

• Preferably someone I love is there.

• I will read a book.

SCORE: 98/100

I biked to the lake, which was really preferable. I should have written “bike to the lake.” I got in it. The lifeguard didn’t want me to go behind the rocks, which she indicated by gesticulating like a windsock. I wanted to tell her that the water was as shallow as a wading pool and I am an excellent swimmer and there was no wind, but she was far away, and I got distracted by a pair of perfect mergansers who nest in the rocks and just keep their beaks open to the wind all day for some reason!? This was the happiest I have ever been or could ever be, without someone I love physically in my arms. 

No one I specifically loved was there, but everyone who was there, I loved.

I re-read Elif Batuman writing about aesthetics while my skin dried off.

[9]

2:00: NAP.

• For 45 minutes.

SCORE: 97/100

Here is where things switched, and I realized I had incorrectly planned. After the lake swim ought to go the nap. I took the nap, and it was exactly 45 minutes long. I fell asleep thinking about what it would be like to wear a sweater that was the perfect amount of cool and the perfect amount of warm when there was a breeze. This sounds whimsical and fake, but when I nap and there’s daylight out, I find that it suits me to think with great scrutiny about fashions. I’ve done this since I was very young, and it’s never steered me wrong.

[10]

3:00: BRUSH MY TEETH, PAINT A BIRD.

• Floss.

SCORE: 0/100

I did’t paint a bird, I didn’t brush my teeth, I didn’t floss. An emergency presented itself where a mattress needed to be placed in a bassinet for a brand new baby! Sometimes this is how it is. 

[11]

3:45: MAKE TEA

• Gently tidy the house while listening to books.

SCORE: 80/100

Foolishly, I neglected to make the tea. But tidying while listening to a book about birds was the perfect way to end the day. Luke came home while I was scrubbing grime out of the counters, and I felt perfectly zen while doing it. Sometimes I’m angry about scrubbing grime. The day had prepared me to really love this short spell of grime removal. 

[12]

4:45: PICK UP T

• Spend the rest of the day with her, ideally in the back yard, ideally listening to music, eating popsicles, or on a long walk. Dancing, near water.

SCORE: 100/100

T and I ate a donut together in bed. Then we walked to the park. I kissed her 100 times. I didn’t count, but I happen to know it was at least that. 

[13]

8:00: DRAW

SCORE: 100/100

As long as I have something to draw, I always manage to do this.

LESSONS LEARNED:

• It’s good to plan your perfect day. If you know what it is supposed to look like, actualizing it is easier than you might have thought.

• There will always be an emergency. If it’s not a bassinet, it will be something else. Once the emergency is dealt with, go right back to the plan and see what’s next. There’s still good stuff on there! The bird can get painted tomorrow.

• My plan is correct for me, and I imagine it will be correct for many people, so I will write in second person: Do something significant with your body early in the morning (running). Do something significant with your mind before noon (writing). Do something significant with your soul in the afternoon (walking to the lake).

• Mornings are for thinking, evenings are for feeling. I didn’t think of this.

• It’s easier to enjoy a day than it seems like it should be.

• Floss.

• Just because you aren’t with everyone you love doesn’t mean there aren’t people to love around you all the time. Don’t forget. The other day I saw a sign that said, “Drive like you love everyone.” I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.

I love you, you know.

Wishing you many perfect days,

Sophie

Parenting Paragraph

All this time, I thought she was saying “apple” waaaay too much, when really, she was accurately identifying things that were purple. 

This Week In Sophie

The winning prints for this month are THE OWLS and THE ORANGE CAT! (I went ahead and made runs of each — just ten total of both, though, so act fast!)

I’ll put one in the mail for my In The Mail Tier subscribers — you can become one of these and never miss a monthly print, btw; you can change the dollar amount to anything above $50 to get that perk. I’ll be emailing you about your address tomorrow.

I’m speaking at MEDIUM DAY!

If you’ve ever wanted to ask me a question in live time, I’m doing a little “writer’s talk” at Medium Day on Saturday! It’s mostly a Q&A (no slides or anything), and it’s free to register. My time is 2 - 2:30 p.m. CT — head on down to see me talk about pep talks for fifteen minutes and then answer audience questions. (I have a nervous fear that no one will come? And so… do you want to just… come and ask me what my favorite pudding is? Just to like, be a pal?) Register here. See the schedule of all the amazing-looking talks here.