Friday Joy: Rest
“How will you be useless to capitalism today?”
Welcome to Friday Joy! This is a weekly short piece on something that is making me happy, and a few recommendations for books, recipes, and articles to check out. I hope it brings something good into the end of your week.
On Saturday morning I finally accepted that the allergies I thought I had been fighting for the last two days were actually, regrettably, a cold. I was congested and achy. I told Rob I wasn't going to our older son's soccer game and took to bed immediately.
I don't think I would have done that if I hadn't had Covid in late spring of this year. After my known exposure and positive test, I spent five days alone in my bedroom while family life and the world rushed on outside my door. Aside from the fatigue and coughing fits, it was…glorious. (Of course, being able to have this kind of isolation was an immense privilege due to having a parenting partner, a job that provided Covid leave, and a case of Covid that was relatively mild. Rest is not equitable.)
I had not had that kind of forced stillness since becoming a parent. It was only a few weeks after Mother's Day, and I joked to a friend who was checking in on me over text that I was having Mother's Day every day, but better—breakfast in bed, the whole morning to read the Sunday New York Times, hours spent reading novels, watching Netflix, staring out the window solving unimportant neighborhood mysteries like, Who drives the Sandals-Resort-branded minivan always parked across the street? and Does anyone ever enter or exit that creepy, windowless Knights of Columbus building? Rob told me I had “gone full Rear Window.”
It was many days beyond what I ever would have allowed myself under normal circumstances. I couldn't even feel guilty about it. I didn't. And that was part of what made it so luxurious, that time of rest. So truly restful.
I am actually pretty good at saying no to what drains me, and knowing when I need a break to take a walk or go to bed early or stare out a window (these unimportant neighborhood mysteries aren't solving themselves, people!), but I think I needed that five days of guilt-free, absolute release from all responsibilities to conceive of a new baseline for myself—a sort of zero degrees Kelvin of rest.
So now I know exactly what place I need to return to, physically and mentally, when I need that kind of deep and restorative recovery, and that's where I went on Saturday morning. Aside from the congestion and coughing fits, it was glorious.
How will you be useless to capitalism today?1
What I'm Into This Week
Watching
Bad Sisters on Apple TV+. This is exactly the kind of show you want to start while sick in bed on a gloomy fall day. Dark and funny, with complex female characters and an alpha male villain who is almost too evil to believe, but it's okay because it only makes you more excited for his ultimate demise (not a spoiler). Four sisters have killed the husband of their fifth sister because he is an emotionally abusive, sadistic creep who is slowly driving a wedge between his wife and the rest of the family. But how did they do it? The show jumps back and forth in time and the music is SO GOOD, I have been listening to the official playlist on Spotify all week.
Reading
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. I put this on my library hold list over the summer, and when I saw it wouldn't be my turn for months, I decided to check out Gabrielle Zevin's other novels (Young Jane Young and The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry) and and found that they were the perfect kind of YA-books-but-for-grownups that I am often in the mood for these days. By that I mean well-written, page-turning, and smart, but with a moral arc that always bends toward the essential goodness of humanity, not toward the soul-scraping lows of, say, A Little Life. (Incredible book! But I just can't with relentless trauma right now.) Anyway, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow is about two friends, a boy and a girl, who become best friends in childhood over a shared love of video games and similar social awkwardness, and reunite in college, collaborating on creating a video game that blasts them off into success and all its attendant complications. It's just what I need right now.
Cooking
Pepperoni Pizza Gnocchi from Food52 Simply Genius. I got a copy of this cookbook because I actually have a little recipe in it, a blink-and-you'll-miss-it salad dressing number on page 187. It's a beautiful book, geared toward beginners, with a lot of thorough explanations and simple riffs to play around with. I decided to try the Pepperoni Pizza Gnocchi because a) everyone in my family will eat pizza anytime, anyplace, and b) we usually have a couple boxes of gnocchi on hand. This recipe isn't online, but it is basically this recipe by the same author, except you crisp up 1 cup of pepperoni in the pan between Step 2 and 3 and skip the red pepper flakes. But you could totally experiment with whatever toppings you usually like on your pizza (mushrooms, peppers, sausage, different types of cheese, etc. etc.). Hits all the pizza spots while also being not-pizza, which is good because you know you're probably going to eat pizza sometime this week. Or I know I will, anyway.
Excited About
My brand-new jar of Chai Masala from Diaspora Co. It was time to replenish my supply of Diaspora Co.'s Aranya black peppercorns (THE BEST) and I added a jar of this spice blend to my order, wanting some more hot drink options as the weather cools down. I'm in love with everything Diaspora Co. does—the careful sourcing and equitable payment of farmers and employees, the fun branding, and especially the complex, interesting flavors of super-fresh, single-source spices. The chai masala blend smells amazing; I just need to pick up some black tea and I’ll be in business.
Got a recommendation to share? Reply to this email or post in the comments!
The subtitle quote is from Brontë Velez, via the Nap Ministry, and it’s been bouncing around in my head all week.