Category Archives: Life and Other Existential Problems

Wrestling with Mary Oliver on My Birthday

Creative non-fiction, Humor, Life and Other Existential Problems, Under 750, Year in Review

Warning: This piece contains an unreasonable number of cheese references.

A close-up of a sprinkle-covered slice of birthday cake with the candle letters "Ha" on top, sitting on a crumb-covered plate.

Permit me a wildly self-indulgent post. It is my birthday, and if a woman can’t spelunk into the gooey cavern of her own feelings on the anniversary of her arrival, then when can she?

“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

I started this day as I do most days, forcing myself to wrestle with Mary Oliver.

For a while now, I’ve worked on carving out little havens for myself. Small sanctuaries filled with beautiful sounds and words and things to gaze upon and hold dear. I’ve tried to fill them with people, too. People who smile and cry, as needed. People who are an honor to stand with, or curl up next to, or double over in laughter with in the great messy queue of existence. And people who will, crucially, refrain from being grammar assholes over this entire paragraph.

And then I’ve worked on showing up in those havens, which is harder than you’d think. You’d think once you’ve carved out a space, you’d want to be in it, like a cat claiming a cardboard box. BUT NO. My instinct is to show up everywhere else first.

Those everywhere else spaces need people like me — people who are loud and unsoft in public. The spaces where people like me are asked to stand at the front and project their voices like a malfunctioning foghorn. The spaces where I need to show up (and shut up) so no one else has to be brave alone.

Those spaces can take your skin. Those spaces can be harsh and loud and brisk. I like none of those things.

Being unsoft in public isn’t easy. None of us is unsoft at all times. Even under-bridge trolls need an occasional snuggle and a nap. And I refuse to grow callouses. Callouses are for people who enjoy hiking or receiving constructive criticism, neither of which interests me.

But I go to the places I choose, and dwell among people I choose. Still, my unsoft places sometimes grow raw around the edges. Like a cheese that has been handled too enthusiastically at a village fête.

I want to be brave in this one wild and precious life, the kind of brave that requires ferocity and a willingness to occasionally be the cheese that stands alone. Sometimes I am the kind of brave that is also vulnerable. Different cheese, same position. But lots of people like cheese, I’ve learned. Somewhere out there are the people who love the exact cheese that is me.

I digress. I am also hungry for cheese.

Birthdays involve audits. Spiritual, emotional, sometimes literal, if you also store your things in creative locations and now want to use them to get your special birthday cookie at Crumbl. I use this day to ask myself: Am I who I want to be? Am I surrounded by marvelous, strong, brilliant, delightful people? Is the work mighty? Brave? Honest? (Is it occasionally funny, because bonus points for that.)

This past year has been…well, let’s say it has tested us all in ways that rattle our molars and make us long to burrow under blankets and just stay there for a good chunk of this wild and precious life.

But this is a new year. Every day can be a new year. This is why I wrestle with Mary Oliver and her profoundly, annoyingly inspirational poem.

I’m grateful for my people and our co-carved spaces, and the fact that I have the energy to carve them, and also for the baffling email from my insurance agency wishing me a happy birthday as if we’ve been through something together.

And I’m grateful for the privilege of being invited into some of your spaces.

Because at the end of the day, I hope to ease into another part of that poem: “Tell me, what else should I have done?” and know the answer is

“Nothing more.”

Thank goodness.

Thank goodness.

The Human Exclamation Point

Creative non-fiction, Humor, Life and Other Existential Problems, Under 750, Writing

This is, hopefully, the final installment in my (also hopefully extremely limited) series, “Why Am I Like This?”

Illustration of a white frosted cake on a wooden stand, topped with a bright pink-and-yellow exclamation mark. The cake appears inside a Zoom call window. Text above reads “The Human Exclamation Point,” and “by Jackie Pick” appears in pink at the bottom corner.

Writers are cautioned not to overuse exclamation points. If we must use them at all, we are told to ration them. No Serious Writer™ uses more than three exclamation points per novel. I use three before breakfast. No Serious Writer™ would dare rely on punctuation to do the emotional heavy lifting. No Serious Writer™ would employ exclamation points unless something truly calls for excitement. I have been alive for some time, and few things ever truly call for excitement. Except cake.

But some of us are Excitement Folks. I myself am a human exclamation point. Out of the house, my natural register becomes Jack Black impersonating Judy Garland while spinning plates. I greet people like we’ve survived a maritime disaster together. I smile as if paid by the watt.

Mind you, this is not my natural state, but it is often my public one.

I have long aspired to become awoman of repose. I have tried, truly, to be someone who radiates calm, who says “hmm” instead of “OH MY GOD, YESSSSS,” who does not tell your dog I love him the very first time I meet him.

Alas, my attempts at composure resemble Animal from The Muppets being shot out of a confetti cannon directly into a line of cymbals.

Women of repose give the impression that they read Smithsonian Magazine in the bathtub. I give the impression that I clap when planes land.

Enthusiasm is a peculiar human response to the otherwise bleak recognition of existence. It manifests as sudden bursts of unsolicited and often alarming cheerfulness. Enthusiasm is socially contagious but has an inconvenient half-life of twelve minutes and a regrettable tendency to startle normal people.

For a while, I managed something approaching serenity. My public self finally matched my private one. My resting heart rate was no longer espresso.

Then came Zoom, a technology that brought people together by separating them entirely.

Staring into a camera instead of human faces, it’s hard to catch social cues unless someone types LOL or You are a dork in the chat. Since we’re all deprived of feedback, I overcompensate as speaker and listener. I nod violently and try to show you that I’M WITH YOU AND I LIKE YOUR VIBE AND ALSO I’M TURNING MY CAMERA OFF BECAUSE I’M SHOVING AN ENTIRE COSTCO TUXEDO CAKE IN MY FACEHOLE AND YOU DESERVE BETTER BUT I’M STILL HERE NODDING PROMISE.

We can call that enthusiasm. Or nightmare fuel. Whatever.

Then the meeting ends, and I power down like a droid in Star Wars.

Is this growth or regression? Is my at-home, off-camera restraint maturity the real me, or just battery depletion? Am I even seeing myself accurately? Because, honestly, the only time I see myself is on Zoom.

Both versions of me feel real, but they can’t coexist. I’m trying to find the midpoint between “!!!” and “…”

Maybe an em dash, that modern-day punctuatio non grata.

Definitely not a period though, because I prefer to do things not with a whimper but (wait for it!) with an interrobang.

You Must Be Fun at Parties

Creative non-fiction, Humor, Inspiration, Life and Other Existential Problems, Under 750, , , , ,

Notes from the Coat Closet

“You must be fun at parties” is usually shorthand for “you seem like someone who would scold a balloon, and I don’t enjoy you.” For me, it’s an oddly specific field note.

It’s been seven hours and fifteen decades since I last socialized with any regularity.

I once was, if not the life of the party, the CPR dummy of it: dragged out, asked if I’m okay, inflated briefly, then shoved back in a suitcase until needed again.

Socializing is a muscle, and mine is atrophied because I’ve been on the couch since 2010. Still, I now RSVP to invites aspirationally. I picture Q-and-As sparkling, snacks excellent, and my hair behaving.

In reality, I’m the guest eating chips and dip in a coat closet.

Walk through an event with me. Or near me. Or, better yet, around me:

I prep, of course.

Step one: test-drive some jokes. I am a dancing bear. Dancing bears must dance.

Step two: polish up an elevator pitch about my latest project, which could be the Not-Great American Novel, a nervous breakdown, or cupcakes.

Step three: get dressed (multiple times). Telling me the dress code is casual isn’t helping. Neither is tacking on a word to it. Business casual? You might as well say formal casual, tractor casual, or funeral casual. I choose an outfit fit for the launch of a 1974 space capsule.

My husband is thoroughly briefed: if my grin goes stiff or I start scanning for trap doors, swoop in. When we arrive at the event, he beelines toward a group earnestly debating the finer points of mulch. I, on the other hand, walk into a coat rack while I scan for friendly faces.

There are fifteen people gathered in polite clusters. Ten hold drinks. Four are deep in conversation. One considers the cheese platter.

Conversation zigzags like it has somewhere to be and no idea how to get there. Everyone is nodding, so I nod too. I can’t be the only weirdo not co-signing. Yes, the municipal composting program is complicated. Yes, Pilates is the only thing keeping Marcy sane. Yes, there’s an alarming shortage of teaspoons. I may have agreed to join a militia. I’m uncertain because I am now also considering the cheese platter, mesmerized by a sexy Kaukauna.

It is during these fun, funny, and utterly disjointed conversations the true language of the night is spoken: couples’ signals. A raised eyebrow means rescue me. A discreet wrist tap is don’t tell that story. A quick mime of wiping teeth translates to spinach. A pointed look says oh no, Backsplash Guy is here. It’s a whole conversation under the conversation. I love it.

Then it happens. No one talks for seven full seconds.

BEHOLD! I am the Once and Future Resuscitation Jackie! I’VE GOT THIS!

I mine for stories, giggle at punchlines, toss out “interesting, tell me more” like so many Mardi Gras beads. Folks oblige and share things about how they feel about their HOA (a cabal!), Trader Joe’s (went for the Steamed Pork & Ginger Soup Dumplings, almost got killed in the parking lot!), and one neighbor who lost a finger to a salad spinner (Legend!). It’s great.

If I ask too many questions, I’ll be less talk show and more Law and Order: Social Victims Unit. No one wants to feel like they’re about to be cuffed and read their rights in front of the canapés. So, I watch for any quick eyerolls that say, Help, I’m trapped with this sentient game of 20 Questions wearing a zip-front A-line number.

Meanwhile, my thrives-at-parties husband floats by like a genial sea creature to refresh his drink. I blink in Morse code that I’m running out of questions about bird bath maintenance. I think he’s going to tap in! He does not.

So I persist, though out of steam.

Midway through a discussion about vacation rentals, my strapless bra, believing it was meant for greater things, heads south with dreams of becoming a belt. I do what anyone would do: try to harness it by squeezing my arms to my side, smile like nothing’s wrong, finish my drink, and plot my escape.

Bra somewhere around my thighs, I waddle into the coat closet for an adjustment and some crackers and dip I’ve strategically placed in my pockets for just such an emergency.

Socializing remains an extreme sport for which I am wildly unfit. Will I do it again? Absolutely. Bring on the Kaukauna.