"I Never Knew Despair Could Lie"

I recently read Mary Karr’s acclaimed memoir, The Liars Club. It’s weighty. It’s probably the first book I’ve read in my adult life that contains zero unimportant words. Even with light happenings, a dark thread is woven behind them. The writing is so intentional.


I finished reading it back in September (?) but one new thing I’m trying to do is go back and take notes from all the doggy-eared pages after I’m done as a way to savor some juice out of it. The simple act of typing out the inspired words of others can make them stick to my thoughts sometimes. Recently, I just finished these notes on this book.


The corner of the very last page was neatly folded down like a reading tracker unintentionally over the word ‘fireflies’ - probably the most purposeful word she wrote on that particular page. She was surprised to see so many active fireflies so close to the poisons from the oil refinery in town.  She was further surprised that they would show up during such a depressing season of her life.  She was from a family that only sees, only expects the bad stuff.


A sentence that I had glossed over last time slapped me awake on its second chance to my psyche.


“I never knew despair could lie.”


This morning as I was driving my son to school, I had one of those crystalizing thoughts that take you out of time for a bit - such that when I came out of it, the same man I had noticed crossing the street ahead of us had only moved three or four steps, maybe, and the interview on NPR was only one sentence ahead of what he’d said before I turned inward.




Stress over Covid and back-to-school after winter break and its convenient timing to stir up tiresome, predictable political buzz has managed to invade my repetitive thoughts again. Reminders and updated policies to be more vigilant as Omicron spreads dance on one shoulder as the reminder to be appropriately angry about it perches on the other.  Memories of teaching through this last year directly conflict with any faith I've managed to sweat out of my soul.  I’m finding myself in increased need to manage the mental scope of it, which in turn means I’m managing other things less soundly. 

 Making decisions of any kind feels particularly enormous, as all variables pertaining to most decisions seem unsettling. Should I go to the gym? What protocols are they still doing? Is that much different than going to work? Should that even be the yardstick? Is this restaurant still doing curbside? Can we plan on traveling for spring break yet? How is a KN95 different from a N95?  Am I doing enough to strike a balance between helping my kid feel like a kid while also keeping him safe?  I’m also feeling what most people are feeling in management fatigue. Even though I’ve been managing it all, my memory of how to manage it all is buried in exhaustion from having to remember how to manage it all for this long now.




In the education world, we keep describing this school year as “the third pandemic year”. And yes, technically this is the third school year (19-20 being the first, 20-21 being the second, and now 21-22 the third) that will be interrupted or adapted due to the pandemic. But I’m so used to hearing this sort of slang-statistic that the other day I actually had to stop and do the math on how long the pandemic has actually been. It’s been almost 22 months, or one year and 10 months, not quite two years. Not to downplay the longevity of this thing at all - it has definitely felt like a trillion years since things seemed simpler and people weren’t consumed by stress, loss, anger, sadness, and frustration. But it occurred to me that in all this despair and consequent fatigue, perhaps I’ve been bogged down in the “acknowledge and prepare for the worst” aspects and not as open to the more encouraging ones. 

 “I never knew despair could lie.”


Winter, which I tend to hate, is tough. But it’s temporary. Spring will come, ushered in by my joyous fictional Daylight Savings Day. I don’t know what the answer is, but there’s likely a reason to hope for the figurative fireflies of this season.









I highly recommend Karr's The Liars Club
I will add that it's not a fast read if you're paying attention, but it packs a tremendous punch.