Pushing Through

The above is my dog, Lucy. She is not a costume gal, yet dog daycare had other ideas on Halloween. To me, her expression tells a long and harrowing tale, as if Wonder Woman—while rushing off to save Steve Trevor and defeat the Nazis—had her golden lasso and bulletproof bracelets stolen after the invisible plane crashed, leaving her stranded and defenseless on a deserted Paradise Island. I’m thinking we are all Lucy right about now.

As I wrote last week, my active grieving period seemed to last about 24 hours before I started to get ragey. I’m still angry to be sure, but I vascillate between righteous fury and despair depending on the hour. So I’ve been taking steps to fortify myself, and while they include the obvious, I’m sharing my list on the chance it inspires others. Here it is:

• I’m practicing mindful breathing when I need it.

• Every day, I reach out to one or two friends to see how they are doing.

• I disabled all text and email notifications; this way I control what news I’m consuming and when I consume it. Although I can’t seem to avoid the emerging clown show that is the potential 2.0 cabinet nominees. Serenity now.

• I’m trying to live in the moment when I can. While in the city for a doctor appointment last Friday, I had time to kill before my train so I grabbed a slice at a corner pizza shop and ate it while looking out the window at the people walking along Lexington Avenue. A tiny sliver of New York City heaven for me.

• I picked up some semi-abandoned home projects, including scanning and organizing snapshots from my old photo albums. It’s meditative, and it makes me happy to stroll down memory lane for a few minutes.

• I’m continuing to beat the shit out of the boxing bag several times a week (naming each one, ofc.).

• I’m going all in on the things that give me joy, like preparing for Thanksgiving and needlefelting my fingers off for my Etsy shop.

• I’ve made a point to laugh every day, whether it’s catching up on silly TikTok videos, or listening to podcasts (I love you, Conan O’Brien and the Smartless guys), or scrolling fun social media accounts.

What are you doing to cope?