My partner and I had plans. We rarely make weekend plans, just us, as my youngest is usually with us. Which, of course, is more than fine. It simply means that if we want to do a weekend or grown-up thing we have to click our heels a little harder. A lot of people have this quandary.
Recently, my partner was in an automobile accident. Her car has been in the shop for awhile now, and probably will be for awhile longer. Not long after that, my work truck was stolen. And while that is not officially for weekend transportation it does make the simple logistics easier when needed.
My youngest has a new friend at school, and has been expressing interest in spending time with her over the weekend. I obtained her friend’s mother’s contact info and organized a sleepover. In this way, everyone gets a little bit of what they want. Her friend lives an hour by bus and/ or BART rides.
I have been working a side gig, building a fence for a new client, for a few weekends now, in preparation for Christmas. Yesterday, Saturday, was our last day on the project. We have been finishing at 1 pm on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, so that we could all move on to doing weekend things. Relatedly, with no transportation, two of us have relied on one of our crewmates to give us rides. After work on Saturday he raced us home, and helped me unload the tools and newly obtained firewood from our new client into my garage. I sat down on the porch for a cigarette and a coffee and then my nine year old and I left for the bus.
We caught the 14, which was late, on 14th street. We were supposed to hit the Lake Merritt BART in time to catch the northbound Richmond train with enough time to recharge our clippers, but the 14 decided to take a random detour, so we were doubly late, and missed that train. At the BART station, an elderly man just in front of us rushed to add value to his clipper card, and was about to make it, when the turnstile wouldn’t make it through. He yelled and cursed as we listened to the train pull away. That was our train too.
For half an hour we listened and watched announcements too jumbled to understand as we counted down the minutes and I texted her friend’s mother updates as to our ETA. We were meeting them at a recital her friend was performing at, so timing was pretty crucial. Once on BART, we watched as the delay time lengthened, due to “power issues” on the track. But we made it to El Ceritto Del Norte, and began our walk up into the hills.
For years my youngest and I rode the buses and the BARTS, and we like to pride ourselves on our ability to move quickly and over long distances, so this helps with morale. We’ve been able to have our own transportation for quite awhile, but we still got it.
We finally made it up the hill to the location of the recital. Her friend was on stage warming up, her mother spotted us and waved Seva over. I gave her her bag and we hugged and said goodbye, and she went and sat with her friend’s family. It’s funny how hard it is to simply leave your kid for a sleepover.
I decided to walk straight down to San Pablo and catch the bus, as it was cheaper and I had a day pass on my phone. I found a stop for the 72 that I’ve taken at least once before. It was cold and getting dark, but the views of the bay from the El Cerrito hills as the sun and I both descended were breathtaking.
I waited for 45 minutes as three scheduled buses never came, then finally walked down to the rapid bus stop, panicking that I’d miss both of them. I didn’t, but it was still another 20 minutes before I was able to board. Another half an hour and I was downtown, waiting for another bus that never showed.
The time, the energy and the money it takes to do the simplest things is often somehow completely unregistered by too many, I think. I have a stringent budget practice, and I live paycheck to paycheck. Christmas is approaching, and everything I do is to have enough to make it so that the children are comfortable and fed, and we can relax while we're together and it’s cold.
Eventually I called an Uber. I hate to do it for all the reasons but sometimes you gotta. It cost way too much, but it got me there, exhausted.
The following day I would spend the morning adjusting my budget and continuing to plan for the coming weeks and the rest of that day, which involved biting another bullet and getting a ZipCar so I could do some christmas shopping without being at the mercy of a shitty bus system in a winter downpour. I would end up walking, through the rain, for 20 minutes, to the wrong location to pick up said car, unable to open my phone to even call an Uber so that I could cancel or adjust my rental, both of which I eventually did after sitting in a store front frantically trying to get my screen dry with my aching-with-cold hands. And I would eventually get the car and eventually hit a couple big stores, keeping close track of exactly what was spent on each child, squeezing my way through crowded shopping spaces, actively breathing to retain some vestige of peace.
The car would be returned, just barely in time, after presents and some groceries were unloaded, and I would catch another bus back home. It didn’t matter if this one was late, it was my last trip and I dozed most of the way. I hopped out at the bodega for some smokes and walked the last two blocks, as the rain had died down.
At home what did I do? This was only yesterday. I put away groceries and made little stacks of presents, threw my work clothes in the wash, showered, transferred the clothes to the dryer, loaded the dishwasher and cleaned off the counters. Tomorrow it was supposed to rain and I needed hours and like many folks was conflicted: staying home is nice but I need money. Plans to find my way to PDX and back, to finish the christmas shopping (will I have to take a day off just to have the time?), to update my budget after shopping and transportation catastrophe, all still swirling about as I tucked myself in beneath the covers.
I usually think about my novel as I fall asleep, but I don’t remember thinking at all—just waking up 15 minutes before I was supposed to leave for work this morning. I’ve since been and returned, napped and clicked more heels, and am ready to start over tomorrow.
I can’t help but think about peace— about retaining one’s peace, about navigating this fucked up world with grace, about not letting “them steal our time,” but also about how christmas is supposed to be about peace. Every single conflict is an opportunity to practice fostering one’s own peace, which I suppose I define as establishing a state whereby the world doesn’t disturb my general sense of well being— I don’t want to be sad, or to be mad, or, to put it more specifically, I don’t want to let being those things do what feels like harm to me (and therefore to others). I am in no way invested in a narrative that wants to prevent me from “losing hope” — I think the idea and this narrative that’s attached to it is a misnomer: I don’t think the hubbub about fostering peacefulness has anything to do with holding on to some hope, because as much as I’m always saying we need to learn to live a little bit in the future, the now is where I want my peace to be, the peace I want to take with me into the future. We live a little bit in the future, but all we ever actually have is right now. And inner peace or mindfulness or a peaceful life in my immediate vicinity or person or whatever you want to call it is really just the set of conditions to be able to apprehend that now, which amounts to embodying the beauty of simply existing. And yes I think on some level it all boils down to aesthetics, which I find exhilarating.