Juniper Disco | No. 38

Winter Sky Check

“I knew winter cold like the nuzzle of fjords at my thighs.”
— Seamus Heaney, “Bog Queen”

We lost power for three days. After piling into the bed Charlie and the Chocolate Factory-style, I gleefully dove into my word puzzles and logic twisters and moonlists and art collages and books. I tend to my introversion with great care and in situations when the outside world is unreachable, I thrive. I also own many sweaters.

Every day, I go outside to do a sky check and to take a deep inhale of crisp air. The winter sky is sometimes so subtle it takes me a full minute to absorb. Go outside. Look out a window. What does your sky look like?

I asked for oranges for Christmas. Eating each of these citrus globes, freshly picked and delivered from a ranch in California, felt like an act of defiance. A little “Fuck you, I’m eating an orange. Stop me.”

The birds tuned in to some invisible signal from the brightening days and have started singing again — the true sign of Imbolc and the shift towards the spring. Stephen and I stop on every walk at the unofficial corner of Sparrow and Starling where they gather and trill and chirp and click and belt like contestants in a song contest. Stephen just wants to chase them.

I’m finding ways to reclaim the things they take from us, like the term for frozen water. Some much-loved icy things:

• the beautiful rings of Saturn — 99+ percent pure water ice! And did you know those rings weren’t there when the dinosaurs were around?

• the crystal critters in The Last Jedi and the light glass bell noises they make as they move

• the ice chandelier below the North Pole (see the final episode of Pole to Pole)

• “Glacier” by Claire Wahmanholm (Montreal International Poetry Prize)
  “I am trying to say it’s too late without making them too sad. It’s like how you can’t take the blue out of the white paint.”

• the sliding-gliding action over the ice in curling and the amazing shoes that make it possible

• The Ice Palace by Tarjei Vesaas — real and metaphorical freezing in a frozen waterfall in the Norwegian fjords. “It was a room of tears. The light in the glass walls was very weak, and the whole room seemed to trickle and weep with these falling drops in the half dark.”

I have a burning acidity in my stomach at all times. Literally. I take daily meds. All of my cracked emotions are centered there. All caused by the corrosive 45/COVID pandemic/47 poison salad sandwich we have been forced to digest. There isn’t enough omeprazole in the world to counter living with the consequences of his decomposing brain— every misfiring synapse a toxic idea brought to life in our lives. Each a stinging stab to my belly.

I watch or read something related to space every day, a small rebellious act that reminds me of how small and inconsequential they are even when it feels like they have all the power. I, too, may be small, but so are they. So. Are. They. This universe is magic and it’s forces ruled by science. How lucky we are to be on THIS planet while it can sustain life.

When things get really grim, I take off my glasses and stare at my twinkle lights. That magical blur of bokeh when I cover my left eye is so beautiful, especially when it reflects off the windows and the disco balls that occupy every corner of my home. Beauty in imperfection — a gift perfect eyesight could never provide.

January goals: Rest. Silence. Stillness. Nurturing routines and rituals. Every single medical appointment I had for the month was cancelled. Dead battery. Very sick pup. Subzero windchills. Snowbanks up to my thighs. The universe telling me to stay home.

February goals: Write. Make collages. Plan our trip to London to visit my niece. Clean out the boxes and drawers and cabinets. These are also my March goals, plus preparing for two major medical tests and a trip to Boston. March-marching towards the active months.

I borrow unabashedly from Gen Z, creating cozy hobbit holes all around the house, wearing only things that make me feel hugged, curating the visuals and the sounds that soothe. I read accompanied by an animated hedgehog in grey Woolen socks and a tufted-eared red squirrel in a turtleneck sweater seated by a fire in cozy armchairs. Or in a gothic cathedral in space with a large spinning planet outside my window. Or in an impossibly large library with snow falling on the distant mountains.

I sleep in weird bits, deeply or not at all. My senior dog barking at midnight pumping adrenaline into my fragile system, followed by hours of existential dread-driven awareness. Instead of counting sheep, I’ve:

• determined in which order and by what method my enemies will meet their demise

• visualized scrubbing my brain with soapy suds to cleanse it of all the muck (the right side loving the spa treatment, the left resisting and giving me side eye while mumbling WTF under its breath)

• rewritten my college experience on a patriarchal campus giving the women all the power (that guy who broke into my friend’s room to terrorize her getting a special revenge arc)

Every morning I listen to a guided meditation (on Insight Timer, by Katie Valentine) that asks me to list three things that I am grateful for, three things that would make today an ideal day, and to recite three phrases: “I am supported. I am allowed to take up space. It is safe to love myself.”

You are supported. You are allowed to take up space. It is safe to love yourself.

What does the sky look like now? Go look.

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“Kiss the joy as it flies.”
—William Blake

Whispers of Yes:

• Qless crossword solitaire game — The small flare of joy I feel when I successfully make words from the letters on the 12 dice I just rolled is the highlight of my mornings.

• Nova: The Planets (Kanopy.) I will talk to you endlessly about this series! I own the DVDs and I will watch the Saturn episode over and over. So powerful, so expansive, so awe-inspiring!

• Shrinking (AppleTV.) I love Liz. I love them all. But I love Liz the most. + Great Pottery Throwdown (Roku.) There is something about pottery that brings out the best in people. + The Pitt (HBOMax.) I have to watch most of it with a pillow over my eyes, but I LIVE for the Dr. Mel King moments. Scene. Stealer. + Seven Dials (Netflix.) I really enjoyed this Agatha Christie adaptation. I want more Bundle!

• Even If This Love Disappears Tonight (Netflix.) It’s a sad story, but, oh, will it grab you. This one is for my melancholy girlies. + Elio (Disney+.) Sweet animated movie with fantastical space characters (watched as part of my Saturday morning cartoon routine.) + Donkey Skin (Kanopy.) Yes, the story is a fucked up French fairytale where the king is trying to marry his daughter, but the COSTUMES and the sets from 1970 are incredible! Not one bit of digital anything makes it even more remarkable.

• “How to Stay Sane and Useful in Chaos” on the We Can Do Hard Things podcast. I sobbed my way through this. Again, Abby and Glennon know exactly what we need to hear in the moment.

• Claudia Winkleman on the Dish podcast. I howled out loud at everything she said. An absolute GenX legend!

• The signature lobby scent spray from the Lenox Hotel in Boston. I’ve been spritzing this on my pillow every evening. There’s is nothing more uplifting than whatever magic they put in this potion.

• The Sarah J. Maas interview on Call Her Daddy. I always pictured her as this flowy ethereal woman with wide-set eyes and precise language. Nope! She swears a lot, doesn’t finish her sentences, has a history of panic attacks, harbors deep anger towards situations where men sucked, and clearly pulls from a deep well of strength — all the things I love about her characters! And she blessed me with enough time to read the Crescent City series and to do a quick audiobook revisit of the ACOTAR books before the next one comes out. Also, if we could harness the book girlie fandom energy, we’d take down that patriarchy in a nanosecond.

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