It was Thanksgiving Day at 5 a.m. It was early. I was restless. I was tossing and turning and couldn’t sleep.
My 18-plus-year-old kitty cat with one eye was howling for her breakfast; she is completely deaf so we are the only ones who can hear her.
I looked out the back door window, trying to see if any rain mixed with snow drizzle had started yet. It was too dark to tell, even with the flickering streetlight at the curb which seems to go off and on at will.
The day before, dressed in my purple overalls and “Easthampton” sweatshirt that used to belong to my dad, I planted 50 tulip bulbs in a raised bed that used to host a plethora of annual wildflowers.
After two hours of bending, squatting, digging and bending some more, I ran out of steam and time, and didn’t get to water the bulbs, nor mulch them as directed. So this morning, as soon as it was light enough and felt a bit more than 30 degrees, I headed out in those same purple overalls to do what it took to lay the bulbs to bed for the winter.
I was afraid that I hadn’t planted them deep enough and that watering would just expose them to the elements. I was afraid that the chopped straw I used for mulch would just get blown away by the first major snowstorm with howling winds and gusts up to 40 mph.
I was afraid that my little car, even with snow tires on, would not make it up the hill on Route 143 to Chesterfield later that day for a traditional Thanksgiving meal at my brothers and sister-in-laws. I was also afraid that many people will go hungry today much less have any type of meal at all, will not have enough or any clear water to drink, will not have sufficient shelter to keep them out of the elements, and will be maimed or killed fighting in our country and throughout the world. All of these are true.
Afraid seems to be the operative word here. A friend pointed out to me that our being afraid does not benefit anyone. That if we get stressed and tense and cut off the flow of our life energy and are not in the moment, we are actually less able to be of assistance in any of these situations.
People and their lives are much more important to me than tulip bulbs. But if today, the best thing I can do is to water those bulbs, give them nourishment from the compost that is ready in our backyard, cover them from the elements, and not give in to that feeling of fear that seems to permeate many of my waking moments, then I have done the best that I can. Or have I?
My best friend from college who I visit in Michigan every summer said to me last year, “Sometimes we have to do more than the best we can.” I wasn’t sure what she meant at the time, but the more I thought about it after the trip, the more I realized that she meant we have to start with ourselves, then venture out with our family and friends, and our support system into the community to battle this fear and to be active in proclaiming our values and beliefs.
I voted for Bernie Sanders to win the nomination because he seemed to have values that were near and dear to my heart, and as much as I wanted to have a woman president in the White House, I voted for Jill Stein whose values also seem to be similar to my own.
Knowing full well that neither of them could possibly win didn’t matter. It was more a choice of declaring what I know to be so: that we must assert ourselves in our thinking, in our words and in our actions what is true in our hearts.
As a privileged member of this society, I have an obligation to stand up for others who cannot stand up for themselves.
Jennifer Delozier, of Easthampton, is a writer, poet, creative writing teacher and an organic gardener who loves all kinds of flowers.