oh, you

eleven little love letters to things I'm currently loving

Dear short nails,

I love you. You are the very best length because I can type faster with you. I can throw clay without making unintentional grooves. I can hold pens and paintbrushes and tiny beads so much easier. I can blur pastels with the easiest of ease. I love you. (And I promise I’m working on the biting.)

Dear frozen-hashbrowns-from-Trader-Joe’s,

I love you. You are perfect in the air fryer for 17 minutes at 400 degrees, which is a lot more than the package says, but I love you best when you’re too crispy, with a sprinkle of flaky Maldon and a drizzle of honey.

Dear not-praying,

I love you. I love the way I don’t pray. I love that I don’t feel afraid that something will go wrong if I don’t pray, and how I don’t start thinking I’m an ungrateful person if I don’t pray. I love that I am my own witness to myself; I love that there are no all-seeing eyes.

Dear most-recently-made-clay-pot,

I love you. You collapsed on the wheel when I was testing wall thickness. Out of the kiln, you are even more lopsided and bottom heavy. It’s almost like you wanted to be this way, even though I was trying to make you be something else. I love you for your insistence.

Tiny collapsed pot, I love you

Dear thyroid medication,

I didn’t know you were supposed to have energy during the day! What a revelation. You make my thyroid work. Thank you for making my thyroid work.

Dear pothos plants,

I love you. You survived winter in crappy plastic pots in my bathroom and now you are growing at full speed again from all this summer sun and the wild thing is that I hardly ever remember to water you. And yet you keep growing. There’s probably a lesson in that, or maybe you just are what you are. Either way: I love you.

Dear Wesley the tiny baby mouse in my car,

I love you. I found you wriggling on the floor of my car this week and I think you were born in the air conditioner and climbed your way out through the vent above the stereo. You chirp like a baby bird and you drink baby formula one drip at a time and I could not imagine leaving you to die in my yard, and so now you live in a hamster cage in the garage. You’re teeny tiny and impossibly sweet and I am so sorry that the rest of your family is probably dead based on the way my car smells, but it’s not your fault.

Also: I hope you like your name. I named you after the one-armed Civil War veteran who explored the Lake Powell area and wrote a remarkably boring adventure log about it, because that’s where my car was when you were born inside of it.

Dear CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy),

I love you. When people I love (or like or hate or am generally indifferent to) do something bewildering or dishonest, or when I am likewise bewildered or baffled by my own decisions or proclivities or moments when I cannot access my authentic self no matter how hard I try to, you help me untangle the knots that feel untangle-able. They get a little looser every time. I love you for that.

Dear personal-library,

You’re perhaps the greatest evidence I have that I actually care about myself. I love you.

Dear Gilmore Girls, seasons 1 through 5,

I love you. You’re my all-time favorite comfort show and I never tire of you. Especially this scene. (I have intentionally left seasons 6 and 7, and the reboot, out of this letter for personal reasons — and the personal reasons are that they ruined an otherwise perfect show.)

Dear postcards,

I love you. Nothing makes me happier than getting a postcard in the mail. Last week, I got one and so this week, I will send one (or two). That’s the circle of life, I think.