Five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes
If you steer the boat to the dock, will it always straighten?
I began writing this piece while sitting in a car dealership near Charleston, South Carolina. I’m finishing it more than two months later while avoiding other work inside a country home I’ve rented for the month about an hour outside of Manhattan.
That those two sentences feel so normal to type was essentially the premise of what this piece was in my mind: How much life can change in a year, and how it seems to work itself out. Securing this house was a charming anecdote of good luck mixed with a no-shame attitude. When I returned to New York in late-July, a homecoming to shore up parts of life left behind, the endeavor was quickly becoming very costly. The plan was I didn’t have a plan, and staying in hotels wasn’t a viable solution. When two housing options fell through, I did what I always do in situations like this: Send frantic messages to people who are probably quite befuddled to be receiving them.
And yet, this shot-in-the-dark attempt worked out. I woke up after this flurry of messages to pictures of a beautiful country home that the relatives of a high school friend just happened to be looking for someone to rent. The posting finished with: Chickens optional. I was sold.
A few days later, I stopped by my old neighborhood to visit Billy, the owner of the laundromat I went to for 10 years. When she saw me and my dog standing outside the building, she came running down the street toward us, gave me a big hug and fed my dog some cookies he didn’t deserve. We caught up about life, I asked how business was, and she told me things were still difficult, but she was hopeful. And then she quickly changed the topic again. When she asked about my living situation, I told her this too-good-to-be-true tale about the country house. Oh, and chickens! She laughed; I laughed. I told her it reminded me of the quote about risk-taking that seemed so apt for much of my life this past year: “Leap and a net will appear.” She responded: “Oh, yes, we have a similar saying in Chinese that translates to: ‘Steer the boat to the dock, and it straightens.’”
All the while, this piece kept getting pushed off. The anniversary of the date that had spurred the idea in the first place had passed, and the whole thing started to feel too self indulgent. I didn’t know what to write about until this past weekend. (Tease.)
Channeling Chumbawamba
As someone who has spent a lot of time describing financial and economic reports, I instinctively gravitate to year-over-year comparisons. The number of daily Covid cases is double the count one year ago. The unemployment rate stands at 5.4%, about half of the 10.2% rate of July 2020. Those sentences practically write themselves.
In the rest of life, we also recognize one-year increments — from birthdays to anniversaries to other life milestones, both good and bad. LinkedIn doesn’t tell me when so-and-so has been at a job for 11 months, no, the notification only pop up on that 12-month mark. Likewise, Google Photos isn’t alerting me what happened on the 31st day of March; rather, it reminds me what happened the 31st day of Augusts past.
Even though I know that a one-year demarcation is quite arbitrary, July 9 was a date circled on an imaginary calendar. Don’t forget, I’d remind myself, July 9 is coming up. Yes, I would push the “publish” button on this piece, and it would be the written equivalent of that Chumbawamba song: “I get knocked down, but I get up again. You're never gonna keep me down.” One year ago, on July 9, the very first domino toppled over, kicking off a series of events that has led to so many unlikely changes — like the fact that I’ve written something like this, and that you’re now reading it.
A dedicated reader of A Few Casual Observations (hey!) recently texted, gentle ribbing: “Where's my next newsletter?? What is this a biannual thing?” Gah. I had realized the problem some time back: I was so set on this idea and then, as the date passed, it seemed more silly than profound. Just consider everything else happening in the world lately — from our longest war in Afghanistan ending to the rising number of Covid cases (and deaths) to a barrage of natural disasters caused by climate change. Do you really care how strange my past year has been? I hardly do, and I’ve lived it.
What is the story?
Now with the pressure of fulfilling a promise (mostly to myself) I set out to finish this piece. I played with various themes to find my way back in. Maybe it’s about overcoming a big setback, I thought. No, it’s about our curious relationship with work. Wait, it’s actually about those major forks in life. I really want to tie in the above title from Rent, how can I make this about a year in our lives? Just like that song, I had an idea that felt catchy but didn’t know what all of the ideas in my head really meant.
As for the significance of July 9? Last year, on that day, my workday was just getting started when a calendar invitation popped up with a few minutes notice for a phone call. I knew, instinctively, what news was coming. What do you do when know that your day-to-day life is about to profoundly change? Well, I slapped on a bit of makeup, just in case the meeting was changed to a video call. I called in promptly at 10:00 and by 10:05, the call was over, I was unemployed, and the hastily-applied makeup would soon be streaming down my face.
Don’t feel sorry for the 2020 me, because I don’t. I mean, I did at the time. There were a lot of tears and frantic messages to people begging for job leads, along with sleepless nights rattled by the anxiety of what the future might hold. If you haven’t found yourself working one day and out of work the next, you may be surprised by the wide range of responses you’ll get when you share this news. Expect everything from disbelief to anger (on your behalf) to light-hearted jokes to commiseration to empathy to offers of help to people who don’t say much of anything because they don’t know what to say.
It’s just a job; there’s other work to be had and you’ll inevitably grapple with more difficult news at some point in life. But it does offer a pretty straightforward opportunity for the problem-solvers in your life to step up. Unlike with grief or heartbreak or grim medical news or bad life luck, there’s a solution to your problem — a new job! — and it’s probably within reach. Mix together a bit of perseverance, a no-shame attitude, and a healthy dose of luck, and you’ll be back to work soon, right?!
Goodbyes and greeting cards
And to be fair, those nice words — everything will be okay — were exactly what I needed at the time. And one year out, I can confirm: Everything is okay.
I try to be mindful of my privilege in times like this. I have a certain set of skills that I obtained because I got an opportunity in the first place, an opportunity that wasn’t available to someone else who was equally qualified, an opportunity that was afforded by higher education, which in itself was an opportunity made possible because of the family I was born into. While it may be tempting to take credit for everything turning out okay, that’s simply too generous.
It was around this time last summer that I made a big decision: I would leave New York. Staying just didn’t make sense, and I had other options. This, too, is a privilege I recognize other people didn’t enjoy then — or now. Losing my job certainly was a huge factor in that decision, and made for a way to neatly explain it to some people. I broke the two-punch news to Billy at the laundromat one day. I wasn’t the first of her customers to make this type of decision, she told me.
I knew that goodbye would be hard, which strikes some people as odd; we only knew each other because I brought my laundry to her store, after all. The thing people don’t tell you about living in a place like New York is that your community isn’t just the people you call friends. There are a whole bunch of people — the ones whose birthdays you never knew, whose homes you never stepped foot into, whose life events you never spent money to celebrate — who are as integral to your day-to-day life.
When it was finally time to pick up that last load of laundry, I brought a card with me. Billy brought out my bag, patted the top, and told me there was a card inside for me. She gave my dog a hug, then asked if she could give me a hug. She cried a little bit, so did I. We both told each other we hoped things would be okay. After walking the half-block home, I sat down on my couch and the tears tumbled out. I cried about all of the changes happening in my life, and around me. I cried because I worried about Billy’s business surviving. I cried because I needed some reason to cry.
And then I read the card Billy had written to me. This line stood out:
“When we were young, we always thought life would get better and easier as long as we work hard when we were young, but unfortunately life doesn’t turn out the way we will like it to be!”
I knew that line wasn’t written just for me. It was also written for her. That card rumbled around in a small purse, alongside other things like my passport and stamps, as I meandered across the country. Sometimes, while looking for something else, I would pull it out and read it again.
I saw the sign, but I missed the signs
And so, this past Saturday, I suppose I instinctively knew exactly what the sign said when I saw it affixed to the metal grate that covers the window to the laundromat. I had turned up my old street to say hello to Billy in-between errands in the city. I approached the sign nonetheless and read a message that began matter-of-factly — “We will be closing permanently on 9/11/2021” — continued with some other logistical details, and ended with a note of thanks for 30+ years in business.
I had planned to bring a couple of fresh eggs and flowers, but didn’t end up being so organized that day. Instead, I stood empty-handed on the street waiting for Billy to emerge from the laundromat after she instructed me to go outside so we could talk. I ran through our last conversation in my head. Business sounded like it was still slow, sure, but she seemed hopeful. And that was just a few weeks ago. What had happened, I wondered. When she emerged into the bright afternoon day, I asked that stupid question, even though I already knew the answer.
Billy brushed me off to ask instead where my dog was, about life with the chickens, how work was going, and then — finally — she slowly explained why she and her husband had made the difficult decision to close the laundromat. The problems were there a year ago, as I half-suspected, when we had said goodbye.
I thought of my frantic phone calls and messages to people when I lost my job — that job that was just a job — and juxtaposed it to how Billy stood in front of me, calmly detailing the end of her family’s business and sole source of income. She told me that after 32 years of being her own boss, she would have to go out and find another job. She’ll have to work for a boss again, she said, half-laughing. And, she reminded me, she’s not so young anymore. I feebly offered up help, if she needed it, when it comes time to close up the laundromat. She quickly dismissed the gesture. I told her I would brainstorm ideas for her, but days later, I still don’t have any ideas to offer.
I wanted to tell Billy that everything will be okay, because a year ago, everyone told me that everything would be okay, and here I am standing on the sidewalk proof positive that things are, in fact, okay. I wanted to remind her of that Chinese saying — “Steer the boat to the dock, and it straightens” — as reassurance. But I also knew that Billy’s road back to okay would look a lot different than mine. I thought of what she had written in the card. I thought of how she had surely weighed everything, and made the decision to close the business as a last resort. I though about all of that, and I stood there, only able to mutter over and over again: “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
Billy squeezed my hand, gave me a hug, told me to give my dog a good pat on the head, we talked of getting lunch soon, and then I left. As I walked up the street, I wiped away a tear. A lot can change in a year, only this time, I’m not so sure how things are going to work out.