A therapist once told me that I’m attracted to chaos. This is how I knew she was not a good therapist. She was, it must be said, hired by the mother of the husband I was leaving, in the hope that I could be talked out of it. He was a nice person, but not my person, and I was not talked out of it. That’s another long story.
I don’t believe in love at first sight. Love is too messy, too full of contradiction and indefinable truth, too magic-adjacent to flare up in a moment. Love — real, true love — is a bond, and bonds take time. Nothing good is instant.
The first time I saw my current husband, however, I knew he was my person. There is no rational explanation for this, given my cynicism about flash points. But there he was: My person. Standing on a balcony, on the far side of a courtyard in a strange planned community. My person, saluting me in a parody of my sun-shading hand.
It was complicated. We were both in bad marriages and I had a baby. We were friends for years, but he was my person and the world was upside down.
I am, in fact, terrified of chaos.
It’s true that my grandmother abandoned my grandfather and her two babies to run away with a Mexican playboy. It’s true that my mother left my sweet father when I was a toddler, to marry a dashing misogynist. It’s also true that there are wild women and horse thieves in my lineage, but I did not inherit this penchant for chaos.
I have spent a lifetime trying to outrun it.
I am, after all, hiding from the world in this beautiful place. This solid old house, with its dusty high-ceilinged rooms and neglected gardens. My person and a perfect cat. It took me decades to patiently, piece by piece, build the life that has grown in this place. The mess of ancestry is a thing I’ve been untangling for half a century, so that I can sit here quietly in my good chair and gaze out the window.
It’s been more than thirty years now, with my person. We’ve outrun chaos and, though the republic may fall, we remain sturdy. I bought overalls and tough gloves, hoping that the costume will encourage me to finally get hold of the wild, untended gardens. Yesterday, I dragged sticks and briars to the brush pile and pulled the plastic pots out of the fantasy garden (which may never exist in this reality, because of all the looming black death walnuts). The pots previously held cannabis plants, gifted by a well-meaning friend who didn’t grasp the depths of inertia around here. Cannabis doesn’t work for me. I can’t have nice things, sometimes.
I want order. Clearly defined paths, marked by steps of slate dug up in the back field. A profusion of flora, a delight to the eye and balm for the bad moods. Order requires constant effort, though, a thing I’ve managed in my life but not in my yard. Order requires digging through the muck, purging the weeds and stones, confronting bugs and grubs. A tiny snake slithered out of one of the pots in my hand and I’m still recovering. Creating order is hard, and messy. And scary.
The season will end, eventually, kick me out of the yard and relieve me of the pursuit of control. I’d like to get one thing straight, though, just one thing before the door closes. Something planted by the front porch maybe, or a walnut-tolerant beauty rooting in the fantasy garden (baby snakes and all). One thing to see from the bathroom window, or the mailbox, when the season turns again. I really don’t like chaos.
🌸
Lisa
Things to share:
I read The Guncle by Steven Rowley and note to self: Read more stuff from beach lists. What a delight! Warm and funny, with characters that you care about and would like to know, flaws and all. More well-written, feel-good, beach reads please. (And a beach would be nice.)
I LOVE this essay by
. “I want more than this,” indeed.- on looking for magic everywhere:
“So when my grandmother, a very practical woman with no particular time for nonsense, came to me in my dream and said Walk like a magician, she meant it. Her message was clear; do the thing that seems most impossible. Do it with confidence even if you have none. But do it anyway. Believe it. Trust that you can do it and that you will succeed.”
My summer newsletter schedule may drop to twice a month, rather than once a week (your inbox thanks me). Or less. Or more! This is just to say, I don’t know what I will do but I will do something that may not be reliable. Summer brain, beach reads, and wanting more than this!
Yes but.... you did title this post Chaos. And it pulled me in.
Probably a garden is best practice to tackle chaos. It loves to defy order. It outdoes order in a magnificent way. Maybe you’re at the end of the center bit. Flowering time. Loved the essay, have a person too, almost forty years, I get the long middle...going to hit the subscribe button.
Thanks Lisa, great text!
Don't be scared of snakes, although they are usually not well-regarded they are mostly harmless and afraid of humans. Also, important predators to rats and other pests.
If you look more mystically, they simbolize rebirth and the non-conventional side of women-hood like the original sin serpent. Maybe there's something there.
Anyway, just a boring biologist here defending all animals, sorry. Have a nice week!