This Mess is Mine
And it will be here when I get back
Will you share with us your messy piles of imperfect things?
-Sarah Leavitt
This line from Sarah Leavitt's beautiful graduation speech has stuck with me since I first read it about a year ago. I love this concept of messy piles of imperfect things so much that I have it jotted down at the top of a long-running list of things to do and ideas for the future.
I'm headed out on vacation soon and going into this work week I found myself ticking through the list of all the things that weren't done. It's a daunting list — all these projects, in various states of being finished. How was I possibly going to wrap them up in the next four days, so I could leave everything tied up neatly in a bow and no one else would be bothered while I was out?
Just as this familiar overwhelm spiral started spinning up, something interesting happened: the thought popped into my head, it's NOT all going to get done, it's just going to have to be messy. And I felt the knots in my shoulders untie just a little bit. I took a deep breath and let some of those unreasonable expectations start to slide.
Because here's the thing. Some of the things I was putting on that "must be wrapped up" list are ongoing projects that I haven't gotten to all semester. They haven't gotten done in the last 3 months and they won't get done in the next 4 days. And yes, it is the kind thing to do to try not to leave a bunch of loose ends for colleagues to cover, and I'll absolutely do my best to tie time-sensitive things up (or at least leave good notes), but so much of this can't be predicted. The situations we think will escalate never do, and something we could never have predicted or planned for shows up on a random Tuesday.
Messy piles of imperfect things.
And so sure, it's messy to leave. But it would also be messy to just work all the time and never take trips with family. Never explore new things. Just like it feels messy to put something you've created out in the world, not knowing how others will respond to it. But to never do that is to never have the joy of someone saying how seen and heard they felt in something you made. And sometimes we say awkward things when we're meeting someone new and hours later we think, why in the world did I tell that stranger that I want to crochet tiny scarves for a stuffed squirrel on my desk, and yet how will we find our people if we don't allow ourselves to be authentic?
And so it occurred to me, as I set aside the years' worth of to-dos, that to live, to really live, and to not just exist is inherently an act of collecting piles of imperfection.
Around This Time Last Year
Yep. Sometimes we don’t need to clean it all up for others, either.
Squirrel of the Week
I think we can all relate to Emma the Squirrel, clutching her heart after being startled awake by thunder. (Shoutout to AJ for this absolute gem!)*
*And this is why you messily talk about loving squirrels, because then people send you things like this!
Playlist
These three songs kept rolling though my head as I wrote this essay:
🎵 Mess is Mine / Vance Joy (obviously, per the title)
🎵 Holiday in Spain / Counting Crows (specifically for this lyric: We could probably fix it if we clean it up all day / Or we could simply pack our bags /And catch a plane to Barcelona. . .)
What messy piles of imperfect things have you created lately? I'd love to celebrate them with you!
I would put that tiny crocheted squirrel scarf right up at the top of the list! Hope you had a lovely vacation!