While we've got it
This is Western Coffee—notes on building the creative body. Last time: Why the edge. The whole series is here.
I found myself this week back at the Schwarzman Animal Medical Center, in Manhattan, where a few years ago my cat Tommy had to go when a smaller hospital couldn’t handle the stress on his kidneys from a shiny blue Aleve capsule that he’d found, played with, and ingested. This time it was my other nine-year-old cat, Joan, who needed attention; a routine vet visit this month surfaced a heart murmur, and the only way to know its severity was to get an echocardiogram.
The good news is that Joan is OK. At this point her condition (systolic anterior movement, for the veterinarians and/or cardiologists in the audience) requires no treatment, just regular follow-up monitoring. The other good news is that I have pet insurance that will take some of the edge off the four-figure bill.
In my life there have been some years full of undisguised good fortune, and others where you have to look a bit harder. This was the kind of year when it could feel like the big victory was just survival: for my living loved ones, for my work as a writer, for this little household with its pairs of humans, dogs, and cats.
But then, this year I ran my fastest marathon. I made music most days on a six-foot Steinway, drinking espresso in a flood of southern light. I wrote a third of the novel that has been both dream and shackle to me for a decade. I watched some amazing stories with my partner (Matthew Rhys and Claire Danes working together; a new masterpiece from one of the best living filmmakers; the new Jeff Buckley documentary), built any number of fires with him in the woods, ran by his side in a string of New York counties, and fell asleep to the sound of his breath. Good, sustained paid work came my way from three different longtime friends. I remembered, again and again and again and again and again, how lucky I am to know the people I know.
Loss is everywhere. What we’ve lost, what we might soon, what we’re definitely going to eventually: Those are the options. When something stays in the third category, for now, that’s grace. Happy holidays.
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The pet insurance detail really caught me. Not just the practical relief of having coverage for Joan's echocardiogram, but how it fits into this larger frame about what we get to keep while we can. I've wrestled with whether pet insurance is "worth it" and honestly most people I know treat it like an expected-value calculation, but what matters more is the optionality it buys when something goes wrong. Had a similar moment with my dog last year and realzing I could just say yes to the tests without the mental gymnastics was huge. Beautiful reflection on recognizing grace inthose third-category moments.