Making Friends with Things

For decades I suffered from debilitating migraines. I learned to make friends with the pain. In essence I would make tacit agreements with it. “You stand back over there for a while and let me get this done,” I would think. “Then I’ll go home, and you can have your way with my head for the next day or two.” It was a coping mechanism that worked for me. It was a way to avoid getting nervous and making things worse.

Then I noticed that my migraines weren’t the only nonliving things that I had been making friends with. The act of negotiating that way with inanimate objects was a regular part of my life. This must be some fallout left over from the shy childhood thing, or maybe it’s how I deal with my distaste for transitions. Either way, it’s no wonder I understand why my son might make friends with his magnetic letters.

I have to make friends with my food before I start eating. Sounds silly or strange, but I can’t just “dig in.”. My plate comes with the food on it, and I have to let it sit. I scope out the plate with a surreptitious glance. I used to say I was letting the food get to the right temperature. I know that I’m really giving everyone else a head start. I eat so little and get done so quickly. I grew weary of people looking at me, saying I should eat more by the time I was seven. I learned early to make it look like I ate more than I did when I wasn’t hungry. I can move food on a plate to fool the pickiest maitre de into thinking I consumed almost everything. All of that food maneuvering turned into a relationship with any food that is served to me. “Help me out here, let’s be friends.” Food and I have a deal.

This weirdness has crept onto my desk. I’m making friends with my work.

I’ve noticed a pattern. A new project arrives, and it waits in line. I have to think about it. We haven’t been properly introduced. On day 3, it might gain a place on the corner of my desk. I can say I’m looking at it. I stare at it. It stares at me. It’s the silent nagging of a long married couple who don’t need words to know what the other is thinking. I tell myself that I am cleaning my desk so that I can concentrate on the new project. Really I’m trying to decide just where this guy fits in my work universe. If things go well, this part only lasts hours.

I finish something that gives me a feeling of accomplishment. Like Holly-Go-Lightly in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” I have room for one friend because one has moved on. I pick up the new project. I’m ready to get acquainted with it. I find how I might do this and imagine a way that might look. I write a few words. Things start to relate to each other. I begin to like what I see. I form an attachment.

It’s sort of like when I meet a new friend. A relationship happens. I get involved in working on the project and start enjoying myself. Work is happening. I go with the flow.

Then a completely new project comes. It sits on the corner of my desk and stares at me—for about 30 seconds. I move it to the table behind me. It’s not due until next month.

“Sorry, you’re just going to have to wait your turn,” I say, as I move it. I get back to the friend I was working with.

Don’t even ask about my relationships with little boxes and tins. My husband says they’re more like children to me.

—me strauss Letting me be