The Goal: To Love Anything This Much

It’s the season of thrifting, and this has put me in a pensive and thoughtful place.

When I go thrifting, there are things I can be sure I will acquire while I am there.  You can make a list, check it twice, and you’ll win the bet every time.  My scavenger hunt is predictable.

First, I will find books, and I will search them top to bottom. I will enjoy the search until it makes me angry, and it will make me angry at some point, and I don’t know why, but there’s a very narrow window and low threshold of warning.  Just all of a sudden, I’m done. Hope you found the books you wanted in that window of time, because the window is closed, Trish.  It may have to do with the hodge-podge mishmash of higglety pigglety, the books all smashed in there together, cheek to jowl.  It might have something to do with the constant craning of my neck. Since not one single book is placed forward-facing for my convenience, I’m forever turning my head sideways, and a person can only do that for so long before she switches to rage.  Anyway, it’s a weird thing. I love shopping for the books until I hate it.

At which point I will move onto my next reliable choice, and that is men’s pajama pants.  I need these in my life, and for my money, goodwill is the place to buy them. 

I want them worn and frayed.  I want them thin and tattered.  (This is where Peter would quip that this is in fact how I like my men.)

Whoever is making women’s pajamas is making them far too heavy or far too much – certainly not for sleeping.  During the last week of school before the holidays, we teachers came with our festive wear and our ugly sweaters, and we joked to one another that we have closets full of Christmas jammies for that week of school.  Our Christmas jammies are absolutely not the bedclothes we are lounging in.

What is not too much is instead too little, and I do have some demands.  When I am ready for bed, I do not want the flannel and the cotton, and I do not care if the top matches the bottoms.  I want something that will fight the good fight through a night of hot flashes and I don’t have to evaluate when I last shaved my legs. I don’t want to be hot or distracted in my sleep, and the people designing men’s jammies understand this.  I want something long and modest but comfortable and cool.

Peter said, “You want to wear men’s clothes?  I have drawers of them.  You can wear mine.  You don’t have to wear someone else’s.  In fact, I’m not sure how I feel about you wearing another man’s pants to bed.”  But I can’t be bothered with the logistics or the questions that have answers.  I have my systems and routines, and they involve the circular rack in the men’s section.

The third area that will always get a visit from mine eyes is the stuffed animals. 

And I’ll tell you this: you might be surprised to know what you can find at the Goodwill, and it is the Build-A-Bear variety.  People will not simply part with their Build-a-Bear by tossing her in the trash.  They want to send her on her way in the true Marie Kondo way of gratitude, in hopes of setting her free to a new home with a new story and a new life ahead of bedtime stories. 

We once brought one home that had a recorded love message in the heart within its chest, and our boy Huck carried that audible bear all over the house, as if he had found his own voice.  It was a sweet time when Huckleberry’s bear told us how much it loves us, with a forever love.

And this brings me to the message of today’s stirrings.  Thrifting, Dogs, and Love.

We have two dogs: Huckleberry and Molly. If you’re a West Wing Fan, you’ll recognize these as the names of Toby’s twins in season whatever. (I’m a fan, but not a deep cut fan.  Just enough to name my pets after the character’s babies.  Whatever level of fandom that is.)

Molly is demure.  She is gathered and reserved.  She understands the idea of command and reward, of stimulus and response, but she does not perform.  She will not perform.  I am not your show pony, she seems to say to us when we ask her to sit, stay, and especially to shake hands.  No, thank you.  She will sit and stay because she wants to, and she will offer forth her paw when she needs something or deems this moment worthy of her acknowledgment.  But she will not because we asked her to.  She will do nothing because we ask her to.  She doles out her emotions with precision and care.

Huckleberry, on the other hand, is all in, all the time.  He is a very trainable dog, because he is all about the command and the reward, the signal and the treat.  Yes, thank you.  And I’ll do it again. 

Sit, stay, stand, come, shake, five, paw, leave, give, yes, yes, yes.  He is ever at the ready to please.

Which, frankly, makes him kind of a lot.  He always wants to make us happy.  Make someone happy.  Make anyone happy.  He’s here to please.  And thus, it is a joy to please him.  Because he’s just so pleasable.

This brings me to thrift stores.

Oh, how we love to shop for that big happy dog.  We know already that he will do the dance of the dogs when presented with a new plushie, and he never disappoints.  In fact, we make a point of giving it to him with intention, because we don’t want to miss the joy of his joy.

Molly waits and watches from the sidelines.  And while Huck dog-dances all over the carpet with the object of his affection, she stands in line for a gift as well.  He flounces and fluffs, and she looks at us as if to say, surely, you did not forget about me.  Surely they had something in their shelves for your girl Molly-Wolly-Doodle, Molly-Cakes. She sits and waits, wagging just the tip of her tail, lest she reveal too much hope.

But the problem is that we know she won’t care.  She won’t love it like he loves it.  Nobody loves anything like he loves what he loves.  But she wants us to try. She wants us to offer her something that brings her as much joy as Huck has.

And so we scramble to give her something to show her that we love her just as much.  We offer her the “other” stuffy that we had set aside for Huck, not wanting to overwhelm him with too much for one day, but she says no thank you with her eyes.

We offer her a dog treat, and she acts offended, like she knows this came off the counter and not from the bag from the store.

We offer her ice cubes, the year-round popsicles that come from the Kitchen Fairy.  She dismisses them as they melt.

She waits for the next thing.  She wants us to offer her something that brings her as much joy as Huck has.

The problem is – she doesn’t know what that is.  She is withholding of her joy, dispersing with her judgment, and negotiating with her gratitude.  And it makes her not so fun to shop for.

She doesn’t know what she loves.  She wants us to find it and present it to her, to introduce her to her joy.
But nobody can do that for her.  Nobody can strike the cord that resonates.

Meanwhile, we bring Huck a whole line of offerings. In fact, just writing about it, I may go back to goodwill today just to get him another lick of joy.

After all, ’tis the season of thrifting, and that has put me in a pensive place.

As the calendar turns to the new year, I’m not making resolutions, but I do have a sense of resolve.  (Again, don’t bother my with the logistics of differences here.  It’s poetic justice in action.)

I resolve to be like Huck.  To know what I love and to love it completely.

It might make me a lot to handle,  perhaps a distraction to sit next to in a movie theatre, and it may make you wonder whose grandpa’s pants I’m wearing.

But at least I won’t miss the celebration because I’m trying to decide if this is the time to feel it.

Happy New Year.  Be like Huck.