Burnout

During these interminable pandemic months, some folks have been cooking far more than they ever dreamed. Sourdough was big for a while. Three meals a day at home became the norm for many who were working and going to school from a computer on the kitchen table. Grocery shopping felt like an obstacle course: finding the store with good mask and distancing protocols, reserved hours for those at high-risk for the virus, planning on-line lists for curb-side pickup. I enjoy cooking, and most of the time, we all eat at home anyway, so the pandemic did not change much in my kitchen. I have not been grocery shopping in person since early March 2020, but with advanced planning, my kitchen routine is much as it was in the Before. And I still enjoy cooking. But that is not true for everyone. 

I recently read an article about burnout in the kitchen. Tired to the bone with planning meals and prepping and cooking and cleaning up, the author spoke by phone with a psychotherapist who explained what she was feeling this way: 

“Burnout is not the same as stress. …We experience stress with the adjustment to any life change, positive or negative. Getting married causes stress. Job promotions. But with burnout, you stop functioning. You stop doing the things that you typically care about, or you do them, but not very well, or without much feeling. You begin to lose touch with who you are. The most painful part is that burnout attacks things that we typically love so much, the activities that used to bring us joy and pleasure.” 

I think this explanation applies to much more than the kitchen. And I wonder, too, if some of what we label “stress” is really burnout – or a pressure cooker combination of the two. Things we used to look forward to, like getting together with friends, now produce anxiety and dread. We have bowed out of weddings and vacations and ordinary get-togethers. We have even bowed out of our careers. Health-care workers, teachers, ministers, and others are leaving their posts because there is no joy and pleasure. They have found themselves going through the motions. They have lost touch with who they are. 

One of the remedies offered in the article is a kind of mindfulness – setting aside space and time to be intentional, doing something simple but with care and focus, paying attention to the work and its sounds and sights and smells. And sitting with “the memories that come with those sensations. Even if they’re uncomfortable. Even if you begin to feel grief about the day and the year you’re having instead of the one you’d hoped for.” Rather than bucking up and carrying on, this approach welcomes the present reality for what it is – good and bad, beautiful and hard, fragrant and fatiguing. But the experts quoted in the article both emphasize the importance of taking a break. 

“When you’re depleted and running on fumes,” one of them says, “you can start to feel resentful: you’re doing something you don’t have the reserves to do.” It’s okay, she [says], to not feel okay. And it’s okay to eat toast for dinner. 

And for some, it is okay to walk away, to close the classroom door, to step out of the pulpit. It is okay. Better that than become toast….

 

Going With the Flow

Ten or twelve years ago, I attended a silent auction fund-raiser. There were lots of interesting items, but the one that I bid on and won was four watercolor painting lessons. I met with the instructor at a building with a wide porch surrounded by trees. The setting was lovely and the lessons were wonderful. Some time later, our town recreation department offered lessons, and I signed up. I painted some, and then this and that intervened and the palette was put away. But last week, I dug out the paints and paper and tried again. There is technique to master, I have a lot to learn and re-learn, but I am finding lots of on-line tutorials. It is fun and absorbing and challenging. 

When you put the water and the paint – or the paint and the water – on the paper, it seems to have a mind of its own. It runs and blooms and fills. Sometimes the color is pale, sometimes dark. Water on almost dry paint changes the tint and texture. The paint, not the painter, is in control! And the best results are suggestions not reproductions. 

What I "see" in my imagination is not exactly what happens on the paper, but, even so, I painted some flowers the other day. Some of them went on to the paper as colored dots, but they “read” as flowers. I am learning to loosen up, to let go, to see what happens. I am learning that an abstract stroke can become a blossom. I am one who usually likes to have things in order, to know what is going to happen, to be prepared. But somehow the lack of precision with watercolor appeals to me. I am learning to go with the flow, literally – good lesson in art and in life!

 

Scraps

My most recent project -- made from scraps in my stash!

 I am a quilter. I have lots of scraps (thousands…), little two-inch squares cut from fabric that I bought or got from a friend or had left over from other projects. I’ve used those scraps over the years to make some lovely pieces with a technique called watercolor. The design of the quilt is made by the printed fabric, all cut into uniform squares, rather than fabric cut in geometric shapes. For me, the design process is more intuitive than intentional. I usually have a general idea of what I want to do, but then I just start and see where it goes. Some pieces fit right in; others get discarded. And no matter how many tiny scraps I use, it seems there are always more! 

My great-grandmothers were quilters. I have been fortunate enough to receive some of their quilts. Two of them are what collectors would consider masterpieces. One is made of solid blue and white fabric, set in a design known as the “Carpenter’s Rule.” The stitches are small and even, covering the whole piece. The other is a “Star of Bethlehem,” made with several different fabrics but all in an even, matching design. The fabric for both of these quilts was likely purchased. They were designed in a certain way, the pieces chosen with care, not made from scraps leftover from other projects. And even though they were made 150 years ago, the quilts are in pristine condition. They were likely used only on special occasions or put on a bed just for show. They are beautiful. 

There is another quilt in this collection, not a masterpiece at all. It is made of random scraps, mostly dark fabrics. Unlike the other two, it is worn, the batting coming out in places. The stitches are longer and seem as though they were put in with haste. This was a quilt not to admire, not to showcase one’s needlework, but a quilt to use. It must have kept generations of us warm. When we were small and it was on the bed, we pretended that it was a countryside, with farms and roads and fields. We made hills by propping our knees up under it. We ran our fingers back and forth, like tractors plowing in the spring. We traced routes up and down like trucks traveling on a country lanes. The quilt was sometimes folded up to make a pallet by the woodstove in the winter or stuffed into a drafty spot. 

When I start on one of my watercolor quilts, I never know exactly how it will end up. Like the great-grandmother who made the scrap quilt, I use what I have, and hope that what I have will be used. 

Once upon a time, I wanted my life to be like those two heirloom-quality quilts, carefully constructed from fabric intentionally chosen, lovely to look at, all planned out. But reality is more random. I so just keep stitching together all the scraps of my life and hope that the outcome will be warm and useful. And maybe even beautiful!

 

A Lesson from the Bees

I started the summer season with three colonies of bees. Two of them were nucs – short for nucleus, five frames, half of a “box,” with a queen and larva or baby bees. One of the nucs grew and grew, new bees popping out and lots of activity. The other one was slower, smaller, not so active. The third hive was on its second year. The girls had survived the winter and were busy multiplying, coming and going, bringing back nectar and pollen. 

Yesterday, I checked on the hives. The small hive is no more. I think they just died out. Maybe the queen was not strong and did not survive. The hive from last year is empty, too. I think it may have swarmed. I’ll do a closer check in a day or so. The third hive, the one that started as a nuc, seems healthy and strong. But the honey super, the small box on top of the hive where the bees put extra honey, was bare. No honey this year. I hope they have put some down below for the winter. I’ll check on that when it is not so hot. 

And even though I was stirring around in the hive, removing the super, shaking off bees, they were calm. They have been calm all summer. We see them a lot at the swimming pool, drinking water, crawling on floats, even perching on someone’s arm. The kids have learned not to be afraid. They know that the bees generally won’t sting unless they feel attacked. And when they do have to sting, it costs them everything: they die. 

 I think of how casually people attack each other for no reason, especially on social media. Many of the attacks are unprovoked. If people don’t like something, they strike, they sting, they harm and cause pain. I wish they could learn restraint from the bees. 

 In his small book The Art of Pastoring, Bill Martin says this: 

I have often wished that martial arts were taught in seminary…. As a martial arts student, I was taught that a true artist strikes only under extreme necessity and always with the minimum force necessary to protect himself. I was also taught that if I ever have to strike, I have lost.

 

A Tale of Two Men

I was part of a small group recently where people were talking about how long they had lived in the same area. Many in the group were life-long residents. Some, including me, had returned “home” after years in another place. One man noted that his family had lived here for over 300 years. Their home had been a large plantation at one time. Another man’s ancestors had also lived here for a long time; they had been able to buy some land that was once part of a different plantation. The first man’s family had owned property for a long time. The second man’s family had been property…. The two men are devoted to their community. They work together for the common good. They are friends. And maybe it is progress that they can and do sit together at the same table. But the sheer energy and persistence of that second man and his ancestors to get to that table boggles the mind. And we have so much more to do to overcome the injustice of the past that lingers on into the present. Lord, have mercy.