I Feel Like Working Again

I couldn't get out of bed and wasted hours on the Net, in bed or on the couch, and folded a magazine to a fine recipe for Peach-Pecan Upside-Down Cake, and bought the peaches, but they spoiled. And bought the pecans, but ate them because I didn't feel like cooking (call the doctor!) and actually bought frozen dinners, and after a while eating wasn't appealing either (call the coroner!). I re-acquired my fears of bread, fat, meats, calories, alcohol, and sugar, plus caffeine (I'd read up on metabolic syndrome), all of which I'd blithely consumed while vacationing in Portugal where people don't worry, and within a few days of returning re-acquired aches, pains, hypochondria, fear of crime, and blues entirely absent while I was there. Making phone calls was an ordeal, as was sitting or standing; I slacked. I did the minimum amount of work (which is still a lot; there's no second income here) and during the entire past month met up with only two friends. Couldn't write. Exhausted by the very idea of washing, styling, dressing, and making up. Thought I had no excuse. But I was burnt out after working 12 to 14 hours a day for months, so that merely approaching my workspace lashed me with a wave of nausea  and dread which I fought with a firehose of positive thinking--and secretly doing nothing for two or three days at a time, letting matters worsen and fester. And I took no pleasure in anything.

Just today--having separated from one of my jobs--I felt like working again. It took a month of near-idleness to restore me. Two months if you count the vacation. I just made soup and furthermore I ate some. Don't work 12 to 14 hours a day for six months, no matter how much you should, or even for good reasons. This experience taught me there are pressures and workloads I can't handle, or can't handle anymore.

The Ten O'Clocker

It happened again tonight: About 10 p.m. a car pulls up at my house. I'm sitting where I can't see it; I can only feel its vibrations through the floor; then the car door slams. I'm not expecting anyone. Nobody just "drops by" here on a friendly visit, not at 10 p.m.

This happened before, in November, on a Saturday at the same hour. Someone knocked at the screen door, then did it again, harder, rattling it, when I did not answer. I called out "Who is it?" and got no reply. I called out again; still no answer. To my horror, I was rooms away from my phone and saw that I'd left the door unlocked. Insulation blocked all but two of my windows so I couldn't see out or see the car. So I hid. The car left. After a while I triple-locked the door and found my phone and kept it near.

Then the car came back and whoever it was knocked again. I had no enemy unless you count a student whose creative writing described the use of firearms and car bombs, the first student in my 29 years of teaching who, that same week, aware of the penalties, grossly insulted his classmates, and when rebuked, replied very unpleasantly. This time I phoned 911. The deputy arrived 15 minutes later, but the car was gone. I hadn't seen it, or the visitor, so couldn't describe them.

Tonight, when I heard a car pull up unannounced and then a slam and a knock, I secured a certain item and accessories I now keep handy, and with a body hardened by fight training and judo crawls, lay low with my phone where I couldn't be seen, with the item trained on the door. I didn't ask who it was. I simply waited.

She's an Easy Target

Driving on the highway I saw a woman my age walking alone on the road shoulder, an unusual sight. She was hiking. Before thinking anything else I thought, "There's an easy target."

Then I thought: That's what I look like.

I go on solo hikes all the time, and take daily walks on back roads and trails mostly, sometimes crossing highways. City walks were filled with fears about being jumped or followed or harassed. That's not special; that was life as an urban female. In a better part of the city we women wore sweatsuits and sneakers while on walks to indicate that we were exercising and not out on the streets to make money. I gladly moved to the country where walks were carefree and I could forget I was female.

But I had no idea until now what I looked like to others. I tried to think of the last female solo hiker I met on a trail. There are almost none. That's because women are afraid. They're told they should be. There are those horror stories broadcast on TV into our minds. Once when I was fishing in a remote area three hunters emerged from the woods with their firearms and I thought, they're probably harmless--but what if they're not? So now, so as not to be defenseless, I'm armed; now very consistently armed. I'm aware that this isn't a perfect solution. You might tell me to get a man or a pit bull or at least another woman companion. Why? I have the right to walk and hike free of fear. I sure do.