500 words solely meant to make me feel good

Twitter is nothing but gloom and doom tonight. Our current president is tearing down shit like he’s stripping wallpaper. I don’t know what to do so I’m making a list meant to: 1.) Make me feel better, and 2.) Meet my 500-words-per-day goal.

Fair warning, this list is going to keep going until I see a Word count: 500 at the bottom of my screen. Not sure how long it will take to get there – I’m just hoping I can come up with enough feel good stuff without crapping out at only 200-something words. (It’s that kind of year so far.)

500 Words to Make Me Feel Better:

1. Tonight I ran 5.3 miles and when Prince’s “When Doves Cry” came on my iPod I started singing it as loud as I could, and it made me happy as a lamb – running through my suburban, Southern Indiana neighborhood at dusk, in my neon yellow running sweat shirt, yelling, “…maybe I’m just like my father – too bold, maybe I’m just like my mother, she’s never satisfied…this is what it sounds like, when doves cry.”
2. Speaking of lambs – that t-shirt up there is my new favorite piece of clothing. It’s just a plain gray tee, with the words: “I’m a virgin, but this is an old shirt.” I’ve had it for days now, but even typing it here makes me laugh like I’m watching an episode of Veep. For anyone who hasn’t watched The Young Pope (you should start because I would like someone to talk to about it) Diane Keaton was my inspiration. She plays a nun who advises the young, very hot, Jude Law pope. And if she’s not in her habit, she’s wearing a t-shirt that says the same. This is not the best thing about the show.
3. Speaking of lambs part two – in addition to my new love of The Young Pope, I ordered Beverly D’Onfrio’s “Looking for Mary,” which is a book about her trying to find her faith through the lens of The Virgin Mary – which I get. After getting the book and about six episodes into The Young Pope, I got a text from someone who didn’t know any of this with a picture of a rosary and it felt…relevant. The next day, I ended up at a catholic mass for a funeral service. It was a full mass at a St. Mary’s New Albany – a church I’ve been to many, many times, but never noticed the eye painted above the altar. It reminded me of the tattoo I have on my lower back – my tramp stamp eye of ra which I love, and yet sometimes forget I have until a moment like that. When I’m standing in a Catholic Church, thinking about the Virgin Mary and the words Gratia Plena – “Full of Grace” and how my daughter’s middle name is Grace, “…oh, and look, there’s a picture of an eye that kind of looks like the one I have tattoo’ed on my back.” I opted to take communion and upon coming back to my pew to kneel and pray I glanced up at 12 stations of the cross plaque beside my pew – it was the one of Simon holding Jesus. Without any notice or any internal dialogue/stream-of-conscious warning, I started crying a relief-type of cry and for just a moment I felt like I could let something else carry the weight of it all. I’m not sure what any of this means, but I’m trying to get 500 words here and it all seems connected right now. God and the Virgin Mary and my tattoo and random texts with pictures of rosary beads and communion and sacred lambs and young Popes and whatever the hell is happening to our world – I want to thread a purple satin ribbon through it, but I don’t know where it begins or ends.
4. Last week, I was running in downtown New Albany and at the busiest intersection on Elm and State Street – where the line of cars backs up at the red light after they exit 64West – I tripped on the un-level sidewalk and went down on both my palms. In my head, I popped right back up – almost as if I was doing a burpee mid run. That’s how I like to think it looked – like I purposely went down to a runner’s sprint with my hands on the ground and then right back up. I’m sure in reality it was less graceful. I still have a tiny-stigmata-looking scar (to keep the whole catholic theme going here) on the palm of my right hand. I fall all the time, and it always makes me laugh – even when I really end up hurting myself. I mean, falling is funny. So if you’re wondering why I would list this as making me feel better – it does fit into my overall brand.
5. This weekend, I sent an email  to our local Democratic Party Women’s Caucus, asking how to get involved. Next week, my daughter and I will be going to a meeting where we will help put together bags of supplies for the homeless. I am ashamed I haven’t been more involved in the past. Also, I hope they don’t regret inviting me to help should any of them see my t-shirt.

Look at that – over 600 words and a whole five things that make me feel better.