December 31st, 2021
Good enough is good enough / And So On / 202ONE
“I feel the stars are mine / They’re bright in every kind / I feel the stars are mine / They’re bright in every kind”
—Chocolate Puma x Pep & Rash
“We’re the ******* animals”
—Martin Garrix (“Alexa play ‘Animals’ by Martin Garrix” / “Alexa, repeat” / x40)
“I wonder if you know / how they live in Tokyo!? / If you seen it, then you mean it / then you know you have to go”
—Teriyaki Boyz
“If I sound lazy, just ignore my tone / ’cause I’m always gonna answer when you call my phone / what’s up danger?!”
—Black Caviar and Blackway
“Who am I if I can’t carry it all / if I fall”
—Surface Pressure, Encanto
“Dos oruguitas / Against the weather / The wind grows colder / But they’re together”
—Dos Oruguitas, Encanto
“I’ve lived a life that’s full / I traveled each and every highway / And more, much more than this / I did it my way”
—Frank Sinatra
“Yo tengo un cuerpo y lo voy a mover, lo voy a mover, lo voy a mover / yo tengo un cuerpo y lo voy a mover! / desde la cabeza a los pies”
—Diverplay / daycare show
2021! Such a fun string of numbers, small but together mighty. A year of vaccines, a year of healing, a year of hope! A year of going backwards, a year of further divide. A year with democracy and climate scares alike. A year with an Olympics and a new president! A year where it feels like we’re vibrating in place.
I don’t have it in me for the bildungsromanlike posts of years past, but here I am, anyway, and that is just good enough. Good enough is good enough—something I’ve maybe, finally, taken to heart. “You’ve spent so long building, building, building, and now you get to take stock—to enjoy.” —someone wise. They were right. This is middle age. This is good enough.
This is even great: a healthy family, a happy family, playing make believe and practicing magic tricks. A healing member of the extended family after another summer scare, driving around the other one, playing Animals on repeat in the wide and whipping streetways. A safe haven, a safe home, wildfires just a whiff of smoke above the sky (though that even freaked me out; Boulder is freaking me out, too; it should freak us all out), vaccines in arms and T-cells memorizing. Families together, families growing, in ages and in pairs sometimes, too! Livelihoods and day-to-day intact, meaningful, full of important relationships and sometimes just good enough, and that’s okay. We all are enough.
(I’m not ready, I’m not interested this year, in commenting on America and everything in it. I can’t fix everything, and I’m only responsible for so much; I’ve done enough, and am enough as I am. I don’t need to shout it to the world. But you know, I’ll say this: I finally realized this year that almost no one at all, including at the highest levels, including official officials, including experts, knows WTH they’re doing, so why do I need to be at some higher standard, strive for something that’s not even attainable? Even with this pandemic—no one knows! Yet they act as if they know. I kind of just realized this year the complete fallacy of authority, I guess. Blech. Anyway.)
A body I want to move! Bodies we want to move and keep safe and healthy and happy and swimming through the water, the air. Yo tengo un cuerpo y lo voy a mover! Lo voy a mover! I’m always gonna answer when you call my phone! Gold Suni gold Simone, gold hometown girls, the stars are bright in every kind / then you know you have to go? And Jeff, who’s always so great, better than ever, many say, THE BEST. :*
We’ve all given so much, we’ve all given enough. Push when you have to, take stock when you can, and enjoy.
2022? MOVE INTO MEANING. Conscious consumption. And migrate to a new to-do app. That’s enough, too. Happy new year, though 2s are even and thus not my fave, I hope they can be our friend, for once.