ENERGY
I am standing by the kitchen counter, preparing to whisk yogurt into mayonnaise. It is December 24, and I am prepping the Christmas meal. The dogs are playing, snarling and leaping, too close to where I stand awkwardly balanced and fearful of hurting my healing kneecap. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a fight with bared fangs breaks out, serious enough for me to scream and hurl what I have in my hands to break it up. Unfortunately, it is the full yogurt bottle, which I have just opened, and there’s a breathless moment when the dogs and I stare at the splattered yogurt, some of which has landed in their dark fur. My scream has summoned helpers to the kitchen, who shoo the dogs out and mop up the pools of yogurt, while I sit down and shakily drink a glass of water. After my fall a month and a half ago, I still feel vulnerable and easily startled, but mainly the pandemic isolation has left me, and probably everybody else, with a brittle surface of composure, which it takes very little to break....