In the winter, my house becomes a tiny space station floating in the void. Every day after work, I dock my cruiser and step into the imaginary airlock of my screened-in porch, always securing the outer door behind me before unlocking the house door. I deactivate the alarm and peel off my layers of protective gear, shoving gloves into pockets, hanging my padded parka on the coat rack. By the time I’ve greeted and fed my little collection of aliens, everything outside of my home has been swallowed by the cold blackness of night.
In my mind, my neighborhood is a constellation of isolated stations orbiting the distant star of downtown Indianapolis. We are points of light that appear to be mere yards apart, but I know in my soul that there are light-years between us.
Distances are so much wider in the winter, when every trek requires donning one’s spacesuit and navigating the Cold Dark, guided exclusively by artificial light. That seems like a lot of effort, especially when I’m already so exhausted.
No matter how much warmth and light I cultivate in my space station, the darkness still manages to seep in and drain me of energy. The super computer in my palm should makes distances seem trivial. I could contact a host of friends and family members to remind myself that I’m not alone in the vacuum of space. Even that task, however, can seem unachievable. I fear appearing clingy or weak. I’m torn between my need to prove that I’m happily healing and my desire for words of comfort and reassurance.
It’s my first winter alone in several years. I had never planned on wintering alone again. However, I’ve allowed my grief to settle and cool from its previous molten form into a fertile shelf of volcanic soil in which I can spread new roots. But the green, growing parts of me are still fragile, and I worry about my ability to purify the limited air supply of my little pod. I can meditate, exercise (usually via spontaneous living room dance breaks), play release-the-rage video games, paint goofy animals, take long baths with the hopes of growing gills, do all sorts of things to care for myself… But it’s not always enough.
The past month has worn my spirit thin. The Christmas season is supposed to be centered on family, and my family was halved at the start of the year. Every tradition that I performed alone felt like a needle under my skin - not a devastating wound, but an obnoxious prickle, a reminder of how tender my flesh still is.
Decorating the tree was the worst of these traditions. Goodwill received an influx of generic “Our First Christmas” ornaments courtesy of my little space station, and I like to imagine that they were placed on a shelf next to "baby shoes, never worn”. Heck, the scraggly plastic Christmas tree that I decorated exclusively with pre-wedding ornaments outlasted my marriage. Ouch.
It’s been hard to stave back the bitterness. Looking out the window into the frozen waste, it’s easy to believe that the universe is random and cruel and determined to suck the light from my heart into an endlessly feasting black hole.
But then my phone will buzz with a silly video sent by a beloved friend. Or another buddy texting to invite me out to ramen. Or my parents calling, asking about a good time to stop by to set up the beautiful outdoor lights they gave me.
Those gestures bring my life support back online and add a new brilliance to the stars outside my door. They confirm in my heart that the greatest lesson I’ve learned so far is this:
You’ve Got to Be Kind
That phrasing is stolen from Kurt Vonnegut:
I’m ashamed to admit that kindness has not come easily to me this year. I have wrestled with a rage that sits just behind my teeth and scalds my tongue. I have screamed and thrashed like a snared coyote, more inclined to chew through myself than through the trap to escape. I have scrutinized every word of love that has been spoken to me, terrified of trusting that kind of gentleness again, torturing myself with the possibility that I am unworthy of such warmth.
But it’s because I have suffered these things that I understand better the one mission we small animals in our lonely spaceships have above everything else:
Be kind.
Be kind.
Be kind.
Be kind to others when they make mistakes. Be kind to yourself when you’re processing difficult changes. Be kind to your friends and accept their kindness toward you. Be kind because the universe often isn’t. Be kind by being your brilliant, shining self.
We are brief things breathing limited air. We are all space stations glittering in the night. But we can also be space unicorns, defying the void by lighting up the cosmos!
Is that too cheesy? Too, dare I say it, uni-corny? Too bad!
Look: kindness is the greatest magic I have ever known, and I love the idea of a unicorn galloping across the galaxy, scattering stardust, making the universe a little more vibrant, a little softer-edged, a little sweeter.
That’s what I want to do. I want to be my kindest self. I want to aim my sparkly unicorn horn at you and fire sunlight directly into your aching heart. If I am forgotten, if my stories disappear, if I do nothing else during my stay on this planet, let me be kind with all of my soul.
The heartbreak that I’ve experienced this year still clutches me sometimes and makes me want to isolate myself in my space station, muttering hateful things about the nature of humanity into my microwaved bowl of SpahettiOs. I have to remind myself to look at the world with wonder and awe in moments like those. I have to accept that it is sometimes difficult to do that, but it doesn’t mean I’ve lost my magic.
I have to be kind to myself.
I’m stepping into 2020 a lighter, brighter creature. I am less concerned with what has been done to me and more focused on what I can do. The Year of the Unicorn may be over, but I’m carrying that joyful energy forward.
May the lessons of 2020 be kind to us all.
