glimmers from a tired girl

My alarm is going off, again.

I have been mindlessly pressing the snooze button for thirty? Forty-five? minutes now. Finally, I rub my eyes and pick up my phone, opening the alarm app and turning off the row of alarms in increments of five minutes. It was a good idea the night before.

I check my notifications, and my heart rate increases rapidly for the first of what will be many times today.

Amber Alert - Missing Child in Your Area

Oh no, not again.

Air Quality Alert - Hazardous Conditions in your Area. It’s an Ozone Action Day.

Fine, I didn’t want to breathe too deeply today anyway, I suppose.

Heat Advisory - Unsafe Heat Index Today

It’s July in Texas, I would be more surprised if I didn’t wake up to that one.

Breaking News - Former President Donald Trump…

Nope.

Breaking News- 12 people are dead and several more are injured after a mass shooting…

My stomach turns sour.

Breaking News - Governor Greg Abbot seen on vacation in the aftermath of Hurricane…

Breaking News - A hospital in Ukraine is bombed…

Breaking News- A school in Gaza has been…

Breaking News - Children in the Congo are…

I sit up, my brain already overwhelmed from trying to process the stressors and devastation from not only this morning but every morning, for years now.

I really have to stop checking my phone first thing in the morning.

And yet, the next morning I do it all over again.

I feel guilty if I don’t.

And powerless if I do.

I read in an article somewhere (I'm so sorry to the author, I just can’t remember) that it’s better for your anxiety and your nervous system if you don’t look at any screens for at least half an hour after you wake up. I figure it can’t hurt to try, as my anxiety is basically its own side character in my life at this point. It’s easy, at first. I make a cup of coffee in the quiet stillness of the early morning, staring longingly as the little pot fills up and steam unfurls into the air around me. I wake up my Great Pyrenees, still snoring loudly on top of the covers, and take him, along with my coffee, out into the backyard. A few minutes later my husband joins us, and we sit under the massive mulberry tree and watch our dog play. The time always flies by in the mornings, as I try to soak up all the time I can with my husband before he leaves for work; and so after a quick breakfast, he is off.

I am lucky, especially as the introvert that I am, that I get to work from home; and that I have a little more flexibility in my mornings than most people do. I pour another cup of coffee (I realize that this is also probably a factor in the severity of my anxiety, but one thing at a time, I beg you.) I take my coffee and curl up in my favorite chair, a light cotton blanket on my lap. Despite the temperatures outside, I like to pretend that I remember what chilly feels like. And I settle in, scanning over my little pile of books. While I will read just about anything I can get my hands on, I have trouble opening a novel in the mornings. It’s not that I have trouble getting into them, but more of a put it down it’s time to start working problem. Instead, I have really enjoyed starting my morning with a short story or two, or a few poems from a poetry book.

Friends, I know that I am being dramatic here, but these ten to twenty or so minutes every morning have changed my life.

This has not, obviously, fixed all of my problems. I am still a bit of an anxious, doomscrolling-prone mess, but just a little bit less now. I am not here to tell you what to do with your time, and I should definitely not be giving anyone advice, but I am starting this series that I am calling glimmers from a tired girl to share the poems, quotes, advice, and stories that I find helpful and inspiring, and that help me remember why we have to keep fighting.

I hope you follow along on this journey. I hope you find something that speaks to you. And more than anything. I hope you vote.

I’ll leave you with this piece by Mary Oliver that I come back to often.

Don’t Hesitate

If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy,

don’t hesitate. Give in to it. There are plenty

of lives and whole towns destroyed or about

to be. We are not wise, and not very often

kind. And much can never be redeemed.

Still, life has some possibility left. Perhaps this

is it’s way of fighting back, that sometimes

Something happens better than all the riches

or power in the world. It could be anything.

but very likely you notice it in the instant

when love begins. Anyway, that’s often the

case. anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid

of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb.

Mary Oliver

XO- Alys