Digging Deep in All the Destruction

In the course of an hour, Chip and Joanna Gaines transform a property into a dreamy home. With Magnolia Network at our disposal, we can now see them do it over and over.

I don’t know about you, but new suggestions for viewing aren’t landing on me right now. I’m craving the familiar. Not just Fixer Upper, but Rick Castle’s boyish charm, or Dr. Frazier Crane telling me he’s listening.

This is my therapy of late.

We’re all seeking some kind right now, aren’t we?

My friends and acquaintances, my clients, and plenty of folks on social media are expressing ways they’re struggling. Lots of us are high functioning, but much is bubbling beneath the surface. How could it not be?

We’re two years into a pandemic that proved scary and isolating and we’ll be feeling the ripple effects for a long time, if not as long as we live.

This month marks a year ago that both of my parents were diagnosed with COVID and my father didn’t survive it. Precarious weeks of no visits, endless wondering, ups and downs, stress like I’ve never experienced. Most days it still doesn’t feel real that my father is gone.

The world is in disarray. Obviously, there’s Putin’s chaos. But some days it feels just as bad in the pit of my gut that my own country is in such danger of teetering into a place where rule of law is trampled and governing hinges on culture wars born of fear, ignorance, and cruelty. All the crazy we endured during the Trump administration is still here because he is looming daily, reminding us of the damage he’s done and his plans to continue. There is no peace from this twice-impeached con man, and I am stressed every day by his lack of accountability.

And let’s not forget the Supreme Court Justice who is clearly fuzzy on the ethical need to recuse when one’s spouse is involved in a case. It’s beyond belief, really.

In addition, I have plenty of real life personal stuff going on like everyone else, stuff that in normal times would be challenging but now feels heavy and hard.

Case in point, the cavernous hole next to my four-story apartment building this week. About 8 o’clock one morning the clanging and banging began as trucks pulled up and unloaded heavy…