Annie Dillard wrote, “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” On the first of each month, Catching Days hosts a guest writer in the series, “How We Spend Our Days.” Today, please welcome writer Katrina Kenison.
It begins just before first light, like a wave breaking gently at the shore, the slow rising of consciousness. A fragment of self swimming up toward the surface of being, dispelling the textures of dreams. Awakening. The day arrives in shadow and sparse birdsong, the music of bare, wind-rustled branches running with sap. With it, a sense of possibility. Who knows what will happen next? Annie Dillard’s words “How we spend our days” nibble at the ragged edges of my first thoughts, inviting attention. Intention. Or maybe it’s just pressure I feel: Make it good. Make it count.
Today, there’s no place I need to be. Clear space beckons, a parade of solitary hours: a writing day. Already I am itching for it here amongst the warm, tossed bedclothes. I crave the empty moment—the place where stillness meets silence, time unhinges from itself and words begin to stir.
A red sliver of sun inscribes itself across the ridge of mountains, the familiar backdrop to our days here. The bedroom lightens by degrees. My husband rolls over, still half asleep, and lays a hand on my hip, the one that needs replacing, that always hurts, that his touch seems almost magically to ease. It is in these small ways that we care for each other. There’s a part of me that wants to jump up now, spin the shower knob to hot, get on with things—breakfast, coffee, a kiss at the door, good-bye, good-bye, exhale, and breathe it in: the hushed tranquility of an empty house.
But first, this.
A large part of my writing practice these days seems to be about letting go of the idea that if I’m not writing, I’m not being productive. I have to keep reminding myself: meaning isn’t found in accomplishment; one thing isn’t better or worse, or more or less, than another thing. The page awaits. But life is full. And I’m trying day by day to trust that if I’m fully present then I am where I’m meant to be, whether it’s at my laptop composing sentences or in the laundry room folding towels or turning to meet my husband’s sleepy embrace. How we spend our days. . .
The sun inches higher, proclaiming the dawn in a seamless sky. The dog dances her impatient little dance by the bed, barks once, twice, louder, demanding: attention must be paid.
On the bedside table, my phone buzzes. It is not yet seven. A text from a friend: “She died.” This death is not unexpected but shattering nonetheless. The world has lost a person. Hearts are breaking.
Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield writes about the possibility of creating, within ourselves, our own monastery. As we work to quiet the inner chatter, letting go of our notions about the way things should be, we create a compassionate space that allows for all things as they arise—sorrow, grief, shame, regret, frustration, joy. Already, the orderly, productive morning I’ve envisioned has shape-shifted.
“This too, ah, this too,” are the simple words Kornfield uses to remind the heart to soften. And so it is that I repeat them now, alongside Annie Dillard’s potent phrase. I need both. For the truth is, my days rarely unfold as I expect them to. But I can choose, again and again, to stay open to whatever the moment brings.
I prop myself up on the pillows, reach for the covers, my eyeglasses, and search my brain for words to peck onto the screen, a few sentences to convey all that can’t possibly be said. “I’m so sorry. I’m here. So sad. Talk later. Love you.”
In the kitchen I make coffee, slice bananas, shake vitamins into my palm, stare out the window at the sky. I think about my friend, suffering the loss of her friend; soon, before I get down to writing, I will call her. I think about beginnings and first sentences and plans for the day, and how they so often get abducted by one thing or another.
My husband props up his iPad at the breakfast table, eats his oatmeal, and reads the Times online. Yesterday morning, I did the same—a mistake. The front-page story was about a young black vet in Atlanta suffering from PTSD who was running naked through his apartment complex. It was perfectly clear to anyone with eyes that he was unarmed. A cop shot him anyway. Twice through the chest. Once my tears began, they wouldn’t stop. I spent the day in aimless mourning, grieving for all that is wrong—with me, with us, with our country, our world. I took a long walk and made soup and talked with both my sons and didn’t write a word.
Today I sit down with my bowl of fruit and the book that arrived in the mail yesterday, Abigail Thomas’s new memoir about aging and writing, illness and grief and friendship. The title is perfect for those of us who’ve rounded that corner into the homestretch of middle-age, who struggle daily to make our own peace with life as it is: What Comes Next and How to Like It. We are all hoping to learn the secret.
“I wasn’t writing all the time,” this marvelous writer admits on page nineteen. “Days, sometimes weeks would go by without my doing anything at all. I began to feel like something left too long in the vegetable drawer. Then I had the bright idea of starting a weekly writing workshop. There would be a point to me!”
No wonder I love her. And oh, the joy of beginning the day with good sentences—priming the pump rather than bleeding the heart.
My husband fills a Tupperware container with the remains of last night’s dinner, brushes his teeth, claps a baseball cap on his head and makes his exit. I’m grateful for his good cheer, his work, his steadiness. It’s not lost on me these days that while I’m between books, he’s earning the salary that allows my life to be what it is: a luxury of time. For the next nine hours, the house is mine.
Resisting Abby’s good company (this is hard, but it’s a writing day) I close my book and survey the scene.
Once, a student in my own weekly writing class told us that she writes every day, all the time—in doctors’ waiting rooms, at stoplights, while on hold on the telephone, in the middle of the night. She flipped open a well-used notebook full of her dense scribbles—snippets of essays and scenes and dialogue and prose poems awaiting her finishing touch. I was in awe of her output. It occurred to me that, really, I should be taking a writing class from her.
Were it not for the words I somehow have managed to write, and the thousands of hours I’ve spent sitting in my kitchen and staring out the window in order to produce them, I could not call myself a writer. I do not write at stoplights or in the middle of the night or while on hold. Not ever. I write in hard-won secret pockets of time, in solitude. I sit still as a hunter perched in a blind in the forest, breathing quietly, waiting for words to come into view.
This morning, before I reach for my laptop, I need to get a few things done. I water the houseplants, fill the birdfeeder, start a load of laundry and vacuum the dog hair off the floor. Scrub the stubborn remnants from last night’s roasting pan, carry the recycling out to the bin, straighten the magazines on the coffee table, scribble a grocery list for later.
Setting the house to rights is unavoidably, irrevocably, part of my process. It’s not always easy to know where to draw the line. The other day my friend Maezen, author of three fine books and an archive of brilliant articles, and a Buddhist priest who knows a thing or two about discipline, posted this on Facebook: “I’ve washed every shower curtain in the house. I think this means it is time to write again.”
My first thought: “No, no, there must be grout to clean yet.” My house is never tidier than when I’m preparing to head off into the silent woods of myself. Before I can slip away, I must always rinse out the sink, fold the dishtowel.
Now, my house-wifely duties done, I stand once again at the kitchen counter, gaze out to the mountains, and call my friend. I listen to a heart-rending account of last days and final hours, family members arriving, memories spilling forth. My task in this moment is simply to be here, phone at my ear, holding space for her tears. It occurs to me that “How we spend our days” goes hand-in-hand with “This too, and this too.” Perhaps they are two sides of the same coin, reminding us simply to embrace all the truths of our lives with wise and tender hearts.
Already the sun has climbed to the top of the pine trees. Slender icicles release a steady stream of drips from the roof; the snow is receding at long last but not soon enough for me. A ravenous hairy woodpecker has made its way through half of the sunflower seed I just put out.
A fox trots by. (I think of her as my totem, this bold, graceful animal, for rarely does a day pass that I don’t catch sight of her going about her own business in the world on the other side of the windowpane.) She glances briefly up at me and continues on her way, alongside the stone wall, down the driveway, across the road. She knows what she’s about, is as much a tenant of this patch of earth as I am. I watch a squirrel poised on the lip of the bird bath, sipping at a bit of ice melt there. Everywhere, life is resuming, poised to be quickened by warmth and thaw and rain.
Across town, my friend Maude is presiding over the daily births of spring lambs. My laptop pings with the arrival of her photos, newborns so impossibly delicate and adorable they defy description or belief. She sends videos capturing first steps, hops, tiny bleats. And then, inevitably, emails entitled “sad news.” Each lamb lost is another small heartbreak; she feels every death deeply. The mothers cry piteously for their babies and Maude weeps with them and then reports the toll. I write her back, a sympathy note for every lamb she cannot save. “This too, ah, this too”: the only solace I can offer. All days are numbered and the world shall keep turning with and without us, life and death inextricably linked. We hurt and find a way to bear the sorrow, for it is surely our awareness of life’s fleetingness that allows us to fully grasp its beauty.
My writing day is already half over. “I haven’t yet begun,” I think anxiously. “It’s slipping away.” In fact, I haven’t missed it. I will never separate my writing from my living or my living from the work of tending whatever is in front of me in the moment—the bread crumbs on the counter, a friend in need, the pink geranium’s falling petals, the words that arrive so slowly on the page. It is all one, as continuous as the dawn sky.
And perhaps I have begun, almost without knowing it. Perhaps I began hours ago, in the diffused light of sunrise, listening to a husband’s quiet breathing, to mourning doves and wind-murmer. We live surrounded by story. To write is simply to pay attention, to allow the day its ebb and flow, to summon up its riches and find some way to give them form.
I sit down, curl my toes around the rung of the kitchen stool and begin to type.
“It begins just before first light, like a wave breaking gently at the shore, the slow rising of consciousness…”
~
AND THOSE SAME 3 QUESTIONS…
1. What is the best book you’ve read in the last few months and how did you choose it?
- I rarely pre-order a book, but I knew that when Abigail Thomas’s new memoir came out I’d just want to drop everything and read it. I think Safekeeping is one of the most magical, moving, brilliantly written memoirs of all time. I’ve read it three times, in part to try to figure out how she does so much with so little. And like that first memoir of hers, What Comes Next and How to Like It is also written in small, deceptively simple but deeply revealing vignettes that speak volumes. She is the Queen of White Space. I’m in awe.
2. Would you give us one little piece of writing advice?
- Write for yourself, for the joy of it and to discover how you feel and what you need to say, with nary a thought for your readers and what they may think. And then, before you send your work into the world, read it carefully, as if through the eyes someone else. Make sure nothing you’ve written will cause pain to another. I think the precept of bioethics that med students learn applies to writing as well: “First, do no harm.”
3. What is your strangest reading or writing habit?
- I am kind of obsessed with commas. I love them. I ponder every comma, I use lots of commas, and then I always do an edit that’s mostly about taking quite a few out. I play around with commas right up until the final moment. And I always pay close attention to other writers’ commas, too.
By Katrina Kenison:
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—Other Writers in the Series—
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I absolutely adore this series and to read these intimate reflections from one of my all-time favorite writers about her day is an enormous privilege. I agree with you on Safekeeping and must read this new memoir. And both Dillard’s and Kornfield’s words are among those I hear most often in my own head, as I suspect you know. xoxox
I read What Comes Next in two days, gulping it down. You will love it. And I love that you’re here. Thank you! (And yes, we need these words, all of them, don’t we?)
This is a lovely post, and such a good reminder, for me, that writing is living. They are all tangled up together. I sometimes (ok fine always) feel guilty when I’m not writing during the few hours I have (my kids are young), and no doubt some people are daily scribblers, but right now I’m not, and maybe I never will be. But as long as I’m fully engaged in my life that is ok.
(By the way, I went back and added a few commas!)
Thanks Dana. The challenge, really, is to see the beauty in the tangle — and to let go of that guilt. (Easier said than done!)
Reading this meditation on writing and life itself slowed my breath and heightened my senses. Oh these beginnings and endings, and us in the midst of it all, finding our words and our way in the world. “We live surrounded by story. To write is simply to pay attention…” I will carry these words with me…thank you.
Thank you Dina! Writing (and reading!) do that for us, certainly for me. I read a few lines and then look up at my surroundings with fresh eyes. And with a kind of gratitude for the kinship we find in words. You get it. And I’m grateful.
I just started Abigail Thomas’s new one last night and was so similarly struck. And just a thought about those commas– it seems to me that you are all about the pause, Katrina, about the elegant pause, so it feels just right that you would use commas liberally and then pause to take back some of them.
Oh my goodness, I never thought of that! Thank you! Yes, I am about the pause. The pause as practice as well as punctuation. Isn’t Abby’s book just fabulous? I want everyone I know to read it.
It is so good to read you here, Katrina. The unfolding of your morning brings to mind the way time seems to pause before it slips away or, as you say, morphs into a day altogether different from the one we envisioned. I am looking forward to reading Abigail Thomas’ book but I am happy I got to read your essay today, especially for this line, “We live surrounded by story. To write is simply to pay attention, to allow the day its ebb and flow, to summon up its riches and find some way to give them form.”
Thank you Betsy. This is, all of it, the work we’re all engaged in. It’s so heartening to know we have colleagues — not only in the writing but in the living and the tending and the learning. And I do have to keep reminding myself, it’s all one.
Katrina, as usual your words have soothed me, inspired me and left me wanting more. Beautiful post.
Thank you. It was a lovely challenge to have this assignment, to write for a different place, to stretch my wings a bit. So glad you’re here.
Thank You.
Janna, indeed, yes. (Someone said, we read to remember we aren’t alone. I’m pretty sure we write for the same reason!)
Absolutely beautiful. I love this and find it resonates deeply with my own life and work: “I will never separate my writing from my living or my living from the work of tending whatever is in front of me in the moment.” Yes.
Thank you Laura. Now, really, this is the practice of a lifetime, right?
“My house is never tidier than when I’m preparing to head off into the silent woods of myself. Before I can slip away, I must always rinse out the sink, fold the dishtowel.”
My heart leaps for joy… for I am with you… wiping down the counter & folding the dishcloth…before I head off… anywhere! As I have longed to hear another woman give voice to such simple orderliness in one’s day… I am relieved to know that these simple things do count in due process.
Thank you from the bottom of my kitchen sink… xxx
And a friendly hello from mine. I have just finished putting groceries away here, tidying before allowing the typing to begin. You aren’t alone!
Katrina… Thank you! I, too… believe ‘we read to remember we aren’t alone’…and yes… I was wondering what you were planning for dinner tonight…( lol ) God Bless our ‘worker bee’ hubbies… 🙂
The whole of this piece is lovely, and deeply resonant. But I had to step away when I read this line, for it reminded me of my Nana. We lived like nomads, and she was forced to join us. But she brought a certain civility–stability, too–with gestures like this. Before we pulled up stakes, she’d wipe down the countertops, swish the sink clean and fold her apron into a tight bundle for travel. And the first thing she did in every new landing place was to unfurl her apron, tie the strings around her tiny waist and set about cleaning the kitchen sinks and cabinets. Reverse order, restoring order.
Melody, How I love this portrait of your grandmother. These are the kinds of subtle lessons that matter most in the long run, as we figure out how to shape our own lives. I think of my grandmother, arriving in a little rustic cabin for a “vacation” week with the family. The first thing she did was empty the silverware drawers, scour the cabinets, scrub the sink. Once the kitchen was clean, she could begin her vacation — which, for her, was just about making dinner on a stove that didn’t work as well as the one at home!
Melody, Katrina… Delighted to read your memories of grandmothers…as mine only came to visit… once in a blue moon. However… I am reminded of my mother on family vacations… placing a plastic tub of water outside the one door of the seaside cottage, for us to wash the sand off our feet before stepping inside… 🙂
I could go on for days about my Nana. She was my rock and my salvation.
this is so perfectly beautiful, and the perfect balm as i pick myself up from a string of deeply disheveled days. i am a disciple of this blessed illuminator who sings the gospel: “To write is simply to pay attention, to allow the day its ebb and flow, to summon up its riches and find some way to give them form.”
“silent woods of myself…”
“…creating, within ourselves, our own monastery.”
“…setting the house to rights…”
all meditations for this blessed day, which just happens to be called, by some, Holy Thursday…..
thank you…..
How well I, too, know those deeply disheveled days. (Such a perfect phrase!) And so, we appreciate each other. Thank you, for reading so closely.
Oh, Katrina.
And oh, you. I haven’t washed shower curtains here, not yet, but there is much to do. Nothing that’s more important than saying thank you, however. xo
Thank you Katrina for posting your intimate thoughts in such a raw and compassionate way. I am drawn to your words and even though we are miles away, I believe our spirits soar in the same direction.
http://heronyoga.blogspot.com/
“It begins just before first light, like a wave breaking gently at the shore, the slow rising of consciousness…”
Oh Michelle you are absolutely right! I love your line: “I take a deep breathe. I can choose how I begin my day.” It’s so easy to forget that we DO have a choice. Yes, we are kindred for sure.
Thank you Katrina & thank you Cynthia for giving us this wonderful series of How We Spend Our Days.
When reading about your day it is – for me – as if there isn’t any clear separation between you and the rooms you are occupying, so that tidying the house is also a way of sorting out your mind. I find it very calming and beautiful.
ps: I’m reading Abigail Thomas’s “Safekeeping” right now – it’s fantastic! I definitively also have to add “What Comes Next and How to Like It” to my list.
Yes, Sigrun, I hadn’t thought of it that way but you’re right — order outside, order inside. It is all one. Read “A Three-Dog Life” too. They are all wonderful!
I will!
🙂
This piece is so delicate, finely-attuned and dense as lace, thread with intricate strands. Thanks Katrina and to you Cynthia. Another brilliant interview.
Thank you Susanna. I did have a sensation of weaving words here, and so I’m glad you sensed that. So lovely to be in this space, meeting new readers. . .
The lovely and always timely Katrina Kenison. The beauty and the breath in your writing always feels like you have gently taken my hand and somehow squeezed a beautiful calming breath into my being, and I sincerely Thank you for this. ♥
Thank you Tamara. Happy to hold your hand!
Reblogged this on Writing on the Pages of Life.
I have subscribed to your blog and enjoy reading and learning from it. This post is so beautifully woven – it reads like a heartwarming prose poem.
Rosanna, thanks so much! I spend a lot of time thinking about structure and playing with it, so I’m delighted that you notice that. Thanks for the re-blog, too!
I love the idea of absorbing the day. What a soft, inspiring piece you have created here to remind us to experience the world and have a little less pressure about writing it.
Thank you Renee. I suspect we all need reminding, even though we already know: just being here is enough, noticing and being grateful. We do put an awful lot of pressure on ourselves, don’t we?
Oh this is a gem. I felt every word, every comma, every lamb and sigh. This too. Thank you. And this: “I write in hard-won secret pockets of time, in solitude. I sit still as a hunter perched in a blind in the forest, breathing quietly, waiting for words to come into view.” Me too.
Pam, You know how much this means to me, to know you’re there in your own blind, quietly waiting. We are colleagues in those rare moments of solitude.
Hello Katrina ~ As I “spent the day” with you here I knew even before I reached the end that I would be searching out your books & visiting your blog. Now I am—as leisurely as I can manage!—sitting with the comforting words that fill the pages of Magical Journey. And as I read the thoughts you so generously share, I can’t escape the feeing that someone is listening to what is on my mind, too…
Thank you—to both hostess & writer—for a thoroughly enjoyable edition of How We Spend Our Days…and the discoveries it has inspired…
Hi Linda, I’m delighted that my day here led you to find my online home and my books, too. I always love it when communities overlap and kindred souls suddenly find themselves walking side by side. Glad you’re here!