we don't carry that brand here
the Luddite struggle
In response to a period of coaching too much volleyball in the fall, I instituted a practice called “break day.” If I’m approaching burnout, break day ideally happens once a week, to stave it off; if things are not so outta whack, I designate a break day for a time when I know I’ll be worn out.
Break day has important parameters:
It is not the same as a trip, a nondescript Saturday, or the time before I go to ref or coach in the evening.
The schedule, if there is one, is comprised solely of seeing friends or choosing to attend an event. Playing in a tournament does not count; it’s too physically taxing.
On break day, I do not pick up a shift or prepare for an upcoming one, I do not look for a new job, and I only clean if I really wish to. I also try to avoid money-making activity, replying to non-urgent coaching-related messages, working on my budget, or recording upcoming gigs in my planner.
magazine, acrylic paint, and glitter collage atop an Anthropologie mail-order bag that I found in the trash (and a frame from the street, of course)
Some example break days, which tend to fall on Mondays:
I puttered in the morning and then spent most of the afternoon re-reading the novel Uprooted by Naomi Novik. In the evening I went to craft club at a nearby cafe, intending to mend but leaving instead with a fresh collage, pictured above, meaning I very carefully rode my bike home one-handed so I wouldn’t crush the paper or disturb the drying glue in my backpack.
I met a friend (my study abroad roommate!) for Brazilian hot chocolate in Seaport. We walked along the waterfront (photo below) until hunger called, picked up some pizza, and then parted ways so I could head to Brooklyn to attend a poetry reading with a friend (from grad school!) at a queer saloon.
These distinctions (boundaries?) allow me to anticipate and enjoy leisure; and having done a break day makes it easier to focus when I am trying to finish something (practice plan, cover letter, dreaded insurance phone calls) later in the week. To be clear, I think break day would be a lot more effective if it were systemically sanctioned (have you seen the stats about four-day work weeks?), but it’s something I do on my own in the meantime.
I wrote about break day in an online forum. People commented that it sounds a lot like (non-religious) sabbath. “Making time for yourself,” one person wrote, “is reverence.”
as my mom would say, it’s almost furniture-painting time. until then, I keep wearing temperature-aspirational clothes and ending up cold, wet, or both. soon, I tell myself, soon.
My wristwatch preferences have become outdated and therefore have started to sound deeply particular: the watch must have hands, and the face must have both Arabic numerals (ideally the whole dozen, but at least 3/6/9/12) and tick marks for the minutes, and if possible the whole apparatus should be aesthetically pleasing, too. Most non-thrift stores, if they sell watches at all, have a maximum of two that fit this description. Recently, having gotten it my head that I did not wish to order a watch online, I tried to go buy an extra one in real life.
This urge prouduced a long day involving three clearance stores, a Target, a novelty shop, a general store, and one (unrelated) infuriating printing interlude where I briefly entertained walking up to the counter and unleashing a tirade along the lines of you’re telling me that even though there are no other customers in this store and two of you working, it costs a dollar fifty ‘service fee’ for you to help me with a twenty-cent print job?
At some point in this saga I decided to check Best Buy, not because I really thought they’d have what I wanted but because I was nearby, reaching a point of indiscriminate apathy, and tantalized by a watch I had seen in their web inventory.
After wandering among the vacuums, calculators, headphones, and doorbells (for New York, it was an enormous Best Buy), I flagged down an employee. “I know it’s a stretch,” I said, “but do you have any analog watches in stock?”
In a practiced customer service voice, she said, “We don’t carry that brand here.”
I learned how to Scotch darn (!) to fix elbow and armpit holes in a client’s sweater, pictured above. I’ve also created a portfolio/ “shop” with some of my mending projects.
Here are this month’s “taking care of our surroundings, writ large” tactics & recommendations:
Wise Owl furniture salve smells incredible (though there is an unscented version), works well, and comes in a metal and therefore recyclable tin. Also, they claim you can even use it to “shine up old vinyl in cars.” Dang, if I do say so myself.
I get the sense that late fall / pre-winter is the best time to oil the wooden handles of your garden tools, to help them weather the cold months, but right about now, anticipating the busy season, seems like a good time, too. I applied some hemp oil to the rake we have here.
I am enamored with fashion designer Joy Mao’s “Hundred Families Robe” incorporating the street map of Manhattan Chinatown. A bai jia yi is a traditional Chinese quilted garment. “Families with young children would ask other families in their community to donate scraps of fabric, and then use the collected fabrics to create colorful patchwork children’s robes. Though born from a humble need to conserve material and share resources, the robes were said to carry the blessings of a hundred families, enveloping their wearers with an entire community’s wishes for a healthy and happy life.”
I’ve started using color catcher sheets from the (natural? greenwashed but probably better than Shout?) brand Molly’s Suds when I machine wash a certain leaky pair of commercially produced pink socks and/or items I’ve dyed myself. (So far I’ve used dye to reinvigorate stained tablecloths, discolored sheets, faded sweatpants, and hard-water-induced grey-brown towels.) I know that claiming a product can solve a problem and therefore eliminate uncomfortable feelings is, well, suspect, but I must say it’s nice to no longer turn communal kitchen towels that actually belong to my roommates a strange shade of peach. Shoutout to fiber/textile artist Elaine Alder for this tip.
New York State could pass the landmark Packaging Reduction & Recycling Infrastructure Act—which would reduce plastic packaging by 50% over the next 12 years and require companies rather than taxpayers to fund the management and recycling of packaging waste—this is a big deal, y’all. Learn more about the act and how to support it here. On a personal note, I feel tremendously hopeful because I’ve lived in a state where the legislature did nearly the opposite. In 2021 the Montana legislature passed HB 407 to prevent local governments from regulating food packaging or containers. Without context, this bill might sound like a step toward implementing standardized, state-wide plastic limits, but in practice this was an (anti-Missoula) move intended to thwart an impending municpal single-use plastic ban. And it worked—although an environmental firm has sued the state over the law, it has stymied various city and county efforts for at least three years so far.
In a sense you are greatly relieved, relieved to the point of saying ‘Thank you, dear God,’ to an entity whom you have long suspected of the most flagrant indulgence in insider trading. —Tom Robbins, Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas
photo of a wall in Gowanus, Brooklyn
If you have not listened to “Cowboy Carter,” Beyonce’s new album, go do so immediately. It is a national anthem.
And to prepare for spring, which tends to start on the calendar before the weather catches up, watch this beautifully lit music video by Sylvan Esso about “shaking out the numb.” What a good mantra for embodying the season.
In solidarity,
Abby