work poem
how simple yet difficult it is to say that I’ve done something that has brought me joy.
how simple yet difficult it is to say that I’ve done something that has brought me joy.
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today I wanted only to clean the apartment, take out the trash, wipe the counters, vacuum, swiffer, clean my slippers in the sink, and then clean the sink
today I wanted only to go to the market to buy yukon gold potatoes, bay leaves, carrots, say hi to the master butcher who returned from vacation, buy a pound and a half of beef
today i wanted only to check the recipe frequently, fill the instant pot and run it on meat stew setting three times because the meat is not letting up
eat dinner at 11pm
enjoy the potatoes
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and even though I derived satisfaction from feeling the warm air churning from the vacuum, and the lavender scent of swiffer solution, and the sweet smell of warm soup–
I don’t call that joy. I don’t allow myself joy from chores or worse, a woman’s work.
instead I demand joy from work in its fullest capitalist form. writing is work, engineering is work, reading is work, because I am never allowed to hate it. I won’t allow myself to break from it.
anything outside work is an indulgence.
and yet, I indulge, guiltily, in hour-long podcast conversations in video form. listen mindlessly about the enneagram personality test and child prodigies because child prodigies are proof that children deserve more access to work and fulfilling careers, for surely this will kill off the teenage malaise that is only worsening under the weight of our directionless education system. child prodigies like nobokov, who wrote his first book at 13 and also wrote a pedophiliac love story that somehow everyone loves because it’s not about that.
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at the end of the day, we repeatedly arrive on the idea of self care, mental reframing, wellness in its fullest capitalist form
if only I could learn to be patient, enjoy the prospect of taking time, and sometimes letting it go, even demanding it of myself, then perhaps it would be considered abnormal to call rest an indulgence
but this is a poem about having sought after rest and failed, about having read and internalized jia tolentino’s essay that we’re always in some way trapped by the market, and about having read and internalized jenny odell’s book on how to do nothing, and still feeling like im not allowed to lie in bed, feel tired, feel absolutely exhausted, and drained
this is a poem about work, the way work manages to encompass and cannibalize the things we enjoy, the things we love to do, and even the things we need to to do in order to continue working. this is a work poem.
this is gorgeous