… on rough days, and gratitude, and how this thing came about

There is always one good thing in a day.

I often remind myself of this. Because it feels true. And because I need to. When my body just aches and I haven’t the strength to shower and the apartment feels empty and silent, except for the whirring of a fan and a space heater. Days like that, I need the reminder. Days like today, in fact.

Restless, craving some company, I get looking about for Ellie — my constant companion, my feisty stray sweetheart of a cat — but she must be sleeping on her pretty patchwork quilt in the bedroom window.

“That’s your Great Grammie’s quilt,” I often tell her. “Did you know that? Your Grammie’s Mom. She was a lovely soul.”

When you live alone, you talk to your cat — often. Well, I do, I should say. It’s not a universal truth, of course.

Couple of years ago, I bought a Paddington bear, a stuffed animal, a children’s toy, I suppose. But I like him and he sits atop a bookshelf in the kitchen space with his floppy red hat and handsome blue raincoat, holding in one hand a rather squished-looking marmalade sandwich.

On rainy days, if I happen to be in the kitchen, and I’m in the right mood, I’ll tell him, “It’s chucking down out there, Paddington. You’d like this day, I think.”

And yes, I begin to wonder if I’ve gone mad. Or if other people do this: talk to their cats and stuffed animals. Then I think of my age and feel a sort of inward shiver, and then comes a thought like, “How did I get here?”

We all have difficult moments, though: rough days, bouts of poor health, periods of loneliness; a day, a week, a month, maybe even a year when nothing, or at least very little, seems to be going right.

The good thing about hitting rock bottom, someone might say (and they do, they say this), is that things can’t get any worse, they can only get better. There might be a grain of truth to that. Then again, I’ve always thought people who speak in clichés should live on an island with others who do the same. Think of it: No one would watch a reality TV show called “Cliché Island.”

Anyway, a point: Earlier I was sitting on my one front step, reading Anne Tyler’s resplendent novel Saint Maybe. When I’m having a bad day (awful pain, restlessness, little energy, foul mood; you get the idea) — I often pick up one of Anne Tyler’s books for comfort, and normally it comes almost immediately. Thankfully, it did again today.

I was reading a scene about a family celebrating Christmas. Ho-hum stuff normally, but not in Tyler’s hands. I mean, out of nowhere came this sentence: “The cat threw up an oyster behind the couch.”

And I hiccuped a laugh.

Then I realized I was smiling for likely the first time today. And right there — that was the one good thing, I found myself thinking. That graceful, deceptively simple, comical sentence. And that it made me smile and laugh.

And that’s how this little blog or web site got its name, really. Because I feel like, these days, we all need to read about things that are good, things that are kind and gentle. (I’m quite fond of kind and gentle, you could say.)

How to highlight that need?

Okay, I’ll try this — I imagine getting my haircut at a barbershop and asking the barber, seemingly out of the blue, “How do you stay sane?”

“Hmmm? Sane?”

“Yes. I mean, with all the sadness in the world. And people right here in Kingston sleeping in tents. I mean, what keeps you going?”

The barber in this vision is kind and gentle. He’s also a sort of practical thinker. And a kind-hearted bloke. “Well, I cut people’s hair,” he says. “One person at a time. I give them the best haircut I can. And ask them about their family, their job. It’s interesting, sometimes fascinating, really. People are, that is. Anyway. I just give good haircuts and talk to people ‘til it’s time to go home, I guess. It’s not so bad. It’s quite pleasant at times, actually.”

And I think maybe that’s why I’m writing this today: to remind myself that it’s okay to be vulnerable. To feel like shit and to tell someone about it. I think the opposite would be kind of silly, ya know? Keeping it all inside. That mostly feels awful.

And I’ve come to believe that one of the most wondrous things about other human beings, even total strangers sometimes, is this: how very kind they can be, how understanding, and how grateful they are to help in some way, with a thoughtful word or two, an affectionate clap on the shoulder, or merely a considerate look and a nod that says, “I know. I hear you.”

Ya know?

And to me that’s a really lovely thing. Not a sappy thing. But a blessing, a gift. And it happens all the time. I’m mindful of that now.

That’s my cue, I think — my mindfulness cue, if you will — to get up and stretch and breathe in some cool fresh October air. To be thankful for that, too. And later, to tend to my body and mind, to rest awhile and do a guided meditation.

I just checked on Ellie, by the way — and she’s not sleeping on her Great Grammie’s quilt in the bedroom window, but looking quite blissed out on the mussed-up bed covers, her head near the pillows. (I bet she uses them like a person when I’m not home.) I gave her a kiss and told her I loved her. But she didn’t wake up.

Another “one good thing.”

Well, many of them, really.

I’m honestly beginning to think that maybe that’s the point.

*****