Unfrozen.

What our bodies know.

This morning, after a beautifully chaotic Christmas, including indescribably meaningful gift exchanges with all four kids plus all four NYC-area grandparents (how grateful am I for that!), calls and texted wishes from friends and out-of-town family, the lighting of the Menorahsaurus, copious amounts of refined sugar, a deserved trouncing of all five of my fighters in Tekken 8, and the annual family viewing of Elf — I woke up feeling like I woke up.

Rowr

While it’s been a busy time, I’ve allowed myself a longer-than-usual period of introspection about the state of things.

Writing without publishing, reading news without responding to it, a reasonable amount of plotting and planning to work through the changes coming in 2025 — the exciting ones and the terrifying ones— all without allowing myself to feel any of it too much.

So maybe it’s not so much introspection as it’s been “holding it all in.”

I’ve also spent the last several months with an increasingly unbearable case of Frozen Shoulder, which has done its part in keeping me home and grumpy more than I would like.

For those lucky enough to have no idea what that means, it’s the common term for Adhesive Capsulitis, which I believe is shortened from the original Latin phrase that roughly translates to Abject Misery for Women Over 40.

Basically, the moment you allow yourself to get excited that Big Tampon may never again get another penny from you, Big Ibuprofen comes around with its grubby palm outstretched.

I joked on IG Stories that Elsa was belting “Let it Go” from my Frozen Shoulder, and I would much prefer a case of Wicked Shoulder, which sounds way cooler and a little less dated. (Womp womp.)

In seriousness, much gratitude to the dozens of Instagram and Bluesky friends and followers who comforted me, shared their own stories, offered recommendations for front-close bras, and gave tips for conquering deeply challenging activities like putting on a coat, tearing a paper towel off the roll, or perhaps pointing at something.

(No thanks to one guy who told me not to bother treating it because his wife had it and “it just went away by itself in two or three years.” You sound like a treasure, Sir.)

After the first cortisone shot failed to do a damn thing in mid-November, I tried a second one last Friday, guided by ultrasound, with the promise that it would work within 48 hours. Five days at most. Any longer than that, there might be a problem.

Sunday came and the 48 hours passed.

Then Monday.

Then Tuesday.

Then Tuesday night.

Yesterday, Christmas morning, Jon made me a coffee. We tucked the last of the gifts into the stockings and…wait.

Was that…was that the feeling of nothing?

A Christmukkah miracle!

“I think the shot worked,” I whispered to Jon, as if saying it out loud would jinx it and dozens of nerves in my left arm would turn on me again in cruel mockery. But this morning it feels safe to say it. And this morning it felt like time to write again.

I flipped back through I’m Walking Here to see what I had written around this time last year.

It was a post I wrote the morning after the 2023 Winter Solstice about letting it all out after a year in which so much had changed in my world.

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Thinking back on 2024, so much has changed again. Some good things, some terrible things. But isn’t that how it always is?

What is life if not a never-ending series of changes that we must learn to adapt to?

(See also: Darwin, Charles Robert.)

This morning, I put on the Apple Music “Easy Hits” playlist, which is a good one. Fleetwood Mac. Coldplay. Goo Goo Dolls. Bill Withers. I cuddled back under my covers, opened my laptop and stared at the screen.

Then I heard those few guitar notes of Fast Car and damn, if the tears didn’t start coming on cue like they always do. But it was another song that really got me — that Passenger song that Sage learned to sing with her “band,” Banda Panda, in seventh grade, performing it for all the parents that could squeeze into the music room, just months before the pandemic stole more of those moments from her.

You only need the light when it's burning low
Only miss the sun when it starts to snow
Only know you love her when you let her go

My baby, my youngest child, the one who sang And you let her go in that sweet tiny voice, is not so tiny anymore.

College application results are starting to come in. This time next year, she’ll be a freshman, home for her first winter break. We will be juggling the comings and goings of three college students (eep!), and one remaining high school student who will miss them terribly.

Things will change again for all of us and I don’t even know what it looks like.

Staring at the ceiling in the dark
Same old empty feeling in your heart
'Cause love comes slow and it goes so fast

It all broke open.

I wrote all kinds of things. I wrote things I want to write more about at some other time. I wrote things I will never share. I wiped tears and finished my now cold coffee. And then I wrote this.

I imagine that in some wiser culture at some other time, there would be an understanding that my shoulder had something important to tell me and maybe I needed to stop and listen.

Photo: Matt Collamer

There are so many things I’ve been holding onto; burying them in the name of “processing.” Political things, family things, work things, life things.

Of course you understand. I think it hits us all extra hard this time of year.

All I know is that today, I finally feel unfrozen.

Wishing you all a beautiful holiday season, whatever you celebrate. If this is a tough and complicated time of year for you, I hope it lands gently. xoxo

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