8, 11, 14, 45
Our family often plays the game 20 questions while we are having dinner. Several months back the children created a new rule: “no feelings.” Not, as you might imagine, that the players are forbidden from feelings of anger or injustice during the course of the game (which do, indeed, occur). But that the item-to-be-guessed can’t be a feeling.
This rule evolved following an incident a couple of years ago during the holiday season. We were well past 20 questions, trying to figure out what little Aidy was thinking, after resolutely announcing “I’ve got one!” with a mischievous smile. Finally, irritated, we gave up, and she announced that her 20 questions stumper was, “the feeling you get the day after Christmas, when you look out the window and all the decorations are still there.”
Not a household item like the toaster or pair of sneakers left by the front door. Not Albert Einstein or a kitten or Taylor Swift. The feeling you get when you look out the window the day after Christmas. And all the decorations are still there.
I can’t be sure, but I think what she meant was the wistful feeling of something being over. Imminent nostalgia. Sad, grateful, maybe relieved.
I know I’ve pointed this out before, so please forgive the repetition, but the fact that my birthday - January 5 - falls just after the new year, and a couple weeks after the holidays, provides an additional layer of meaning to this unwieldy period. The heady rush of holidays followed by a welcome and unstructured break from it all and, finally, renewal. The first day of the first month.
Then I turn a new age. Forty five in 2023.
I’m not unusually excited about it. It’s more like: awed by the sheer fact. One recent morning I was walking out to our car (minivan, to be totally clear for illustrative purposes, minivan), in a dress and boots and my work bag, with my sleepy teenager on her way to high school and I was suddenly struck by the reality of our collective existence. There we were on the stone walkway that leads to the our house. In a friendly neighborhood in Connecticut. With the rest of our family bustling inside. But wait a second. What?
Although I write about these moments of existential reflection quite a bit, I don’t live my life in a perpetual state of wondrous disbelief (at least, not all the time). I spend many mornings having aggressive heart-to-hearts with Gabe about his shoes, which are old and falling apart, quite literally, with spaces where his socked toes poke through. There is a new, clean pair of new sneakers in his closet. New-ish. I bought them months ago, and they’ve yet to see the sidewalk. “Buddy,” I say, leaning on the kitchen counter, pushing a smoothie towards him, like a bartender with all the right answers. “Wear those.”
“I’ll wear these,” he says, and because you should choose your battles - it’s empowering when they’re little, and less time-consuming when they’re big - I leave it.
I don’t spend the entirety of my waking hours in a daze, questioning the meaning of it all (although I do have a daydream alternate life where I became a philosophy professor) because we are busy with the details of actual living.
However, since 2023 began, or maybe since my birthday (it’s hard to tell which, or if it’s either) I have to admit that I have spent some time worrying.
Worry - and more specifically, anxiety - is my Achilles heel. And it’s a fool’s errand. “Worrying,” I tell my three children - 14, 11 and 8-years-old, “gets you nowhere. It’s understandable, sure, but not helpful.” Yet I don’t always listen to my own advice. It’s not obvious in my demeanor, I don’t think. It’s deeper than demeanor; not sinister, but it’s gotten a little louder with recent age. It asks: What if? What if you make the wrong decision? For these three beautiful kids? For yourself?
I’ve been thinking about this a lot this month. Why now? Who knows. The would-be philosopher in me, when released from the grip of sixth-grade-boy shoe and other issues, knows that “worrying through it” isn’t the right answer, so I’ve been breaking out the tools I’ve learned in the many years leading up to this particular moment. I’ve been mindfully embracing the better feelings, and - over deep breaths - reminding myself of the sheer facts.
This is my teenage daughter, who makes me tea at night. And my busy 11-year-old son, with his one continual question (what’s next?!) This is my 8-year-old blond youngest child, who comes home from school, goes up to her bedroom, and does hundreds of cartwheels. Every single day.
This is our house and our minivan. It is January, 2023.
This worrying, maybe it’s hereditary, maybe it’s natural. But among these bright facts, it’s just a post-holiday feeling, worthy of exploration, but not rumination. This is know.
That feeling you get when you just aren’t sure. But you look up - maybe out the window! - and remind yourself: “aren’t sure is just fine.” What if it’s great?
