Soft Things

The feeling runs from my throat, traveling like water or air through my core. My nervous system is activated. I'm nervous. Filled with dread, actually. Today I must begin the task of wrapping up my law firm.

Growing up, my least favorite chore was sweeping. How on earth was I supposed to do a good job if it was impossible to see and capture all of the dust and debris? The broom is an effective but very imprecise tool. As soon as you sweep dirt into the dustbin, some of it swirls up into the air. And what about all of those corners and the dirt you can't see? As an adult, I appreciate such a blunt instrument. Got up enough dirt from the barnyard-adjacent floor so that I won't have to change everyone's bedsheets every night? Excellent.

To close the firm, I need to cancel at least seven active accounts, like Dropbox and Adobe. I'm not worried about that aspect; it's pretty cut and dry. I am worried about the emails I'll need to send and the probate estate I'll need to wrap up, as well as the announcements on social media and in the newspaper. It's similar to the way I always dreaded wrapping up a case or project. I hate billing; there are so many reasons that the job I did was imperfect, and how can I in good conscience not discount everything or not charge anything at all, for that matter? On several occasions I declined to bill people and they insisted on giving me money. That actually happened. Did I just give you valid estate planning documents that will protect you for the next twenty-five years, if not longer? Doesn't matter. I still misspelled your name on the second draft and took two weeks longer to complete the task than was promised.

Several takeaways from that mess, one being I am clearly not cut out to run the financial end of a small business. But also, I find the type of social interaction where I do something and then people have the opportunity to comment on it, or worse, must pay me, is paralyzing, even in the course of a business transaction. There is so much room for error. And it's permanent! Those deeds are recorded in the Registry for posterity. I must analyze, judge, measure, and attempt to deliver exactly what was required, and in turn I am judged. Plus, it's frustrating when people get worked up in areas I care little about: so what if your neighbor's fence is two feet over the line? We're all gonna be dead in 100 years anyway, and who are we to lay claim to the land? And also, it's not like this is a property with a 10 million dollar view of the ocean; your other boundary is an abandoned petrol station. Dial it back.

I'd rather go outside and sit in the garden. Mother Nature doesn't judge me, and all of her beings flit about utterly absorbed in their survival. Everything is open to interpretation. Look at the magnolia, gradually opening after the rain. It's the maw of a deep sea lamprey, the raindrops glittering like so many teeth. Or maybe the gradual descent of the silky pink into a dark mysterious center reminds me of a layered Victorian poem. Perhaps the raindrops, glass paperweights enclosing magenta flames, recall Theriault Cauvin's Bach autrement I. No one asks what I am producing or what the timeline is looking like. It doesn't matter that I am a woman, or that my appearance lacks the gravitas of the Learned Lawyer. It doesn't matter that I cry a lot. Nothing is jarring; the surprises lift my eyebrows in wonder instead of furrowing them in worry.

I will cut myself a dollhouse bouquet of grape hyacinth, brew a mug of genmaicha, light a candle, and choose soothing classical music. Then I will tackle the Hard Things. And then I can finally, finally do the Soft Things.