To love is to be inconvenienced
And other unfortunate truths of human connection
If you know me in any capacity, you know that my large dog is the love of my life. She also drives me completely insane — I swear that she waits until I am finally sitting down to watch a movie or eat my dinner, and then she gets up to drink water so that I have to stop, get up, and wipe her face off.
(If I do not do this, the floors become a slip-and-slide that will end with me spraining my ankle a fifth time. Yes, that is me wearing an ankle brace for the fourth sprain- which happened when I tripped over my elderly cat Merlin [RIP buddy] coming down the stairs- in the photo above.)
At nearly 7 years old, she would still prefer I take her for a 4-mile hike every morning, something my schedule and the central Texas weather rarely permit. I do it anyway, whenever I can.
I let her on the couch, I let her sleep in my bed. I clean the mud off of her enormous feet and vacuum every single day. I spend a big portion of my budget on her needs: food, meds, vet bills (regular and behavioral), supplements, treats, gear, training, grooming, daycare, and boarding. I clean up her vomit and the poop she accidentally tracks into the house sometimes.
I do all of this because I know the day will come too soon when she will not be here. There will just be empty beds, marks on the wall that need to be painted over, and fur I didn’t notice stuck to the bottom of some pants I rarely wear, hanging in the back of the closet.
On that day, I will be able to eat my dinner without interruption, and I will give anything to have her there interrupting it again.
Cultivate discomfort
I worry sometimes that we forget we are supposed to be inconvenienced by one another; that’s what it means to live in a functioning society. We’re meant to take turns bearing the burden so that others show up for us when we need it — and that means that we have to show up, even when we don’t feel like it.
Maybe especially when we don’t feel like it.
Yes, boundaries are important, and we need to know when to say no so that we can show up another day. But it’s also true that too many of us seem to think we should be 100% comfortable all of the time1.
Living in A Society means bumping up against other people who are different from you and learning how to get along well enough. It’s messy. It’s inconvenient. It means we’ve got to give each other a lot of grace when our ideas for how to achieve a common goal don’t totally align. It means we have to look within ourselves and ask if we are putting our own comfort above someone else’s right to live.
As I age, I want to be the kind of person who stays curious. If I don’t understand something and it scares me because I am elderly2 and tired and I have earned my right to just vibe in my kaftan with my cocktail goddammit, I hope I choose to learn more about it instead of trying to burn the world down around me so I don’t have to deal with it.
On the other side of this, it can be especially difficult — if you’re the type that’s been socialized to Give until you’re the stump of the Giving Tree — to tease out where the line is. Protect your peace, yes, but also figure out where you need to sacrifice some of that peace to build a better future you may not live to see.
That means leaving the AC up higher. Figuring out how to repair, recycle, or rehome things instead of throwing them away because we’re too busy and exhausted to deal with it. Using that extra money to fill up the community fridge instead of buying another fast-fashion dress that will get worn twice. Using a day off to volunteer at the food bank instead of binging Netflix (okay, a half-day).
It doesn’t have to be perfect to count. We all just have to do our best to love the communities that we live in every single fucking day.
Get Rec’d
What I’m reading, watching, being haunted by.
What I’m reading: I’m diving into my first Sally Rooney soon for one of my book clubs, reading Intermezzo.
What I’m watching: I cannot wait for the sexy, cold embrace of Hot Frosty !!! (Sidenote: the amount of JOY I get from the Netflix in-universe references to their other dumb holiday films should BE ILLEGAL.)
Escapism: Who’s ready for GIGI THE CHRISTMAS SNAKE??? (Spoiler alert: this kind of inconvenience is not love. Gigi is using you. But it’s for the children?)
Wildcard: Can Someone Please Write Normally About This Fascinating Woman?
Until next time.
There’s another line to parse here between discomfort and pain, and there’s a good chance I’ll write about it from the annoying perspective of F I T N E S S buckle up buttercup
So, like, above age 25 for women, I guess?