In the Meantime

Read a good book. Go to the library and check out a hard-backed copy. Smell the pages. Listen to the plastic covering crinkle.

Read The Good Book. Start with James, and don’t skip over the part about the tongue.

Drive in the country. Walk in the park.

Rock a baby.

Sing “Jeremiah Was a Bullfrog.”

Suck the juice out of an orange, then peel back the rind and devour the guts of it.

Call your oldest relative. Or better yet, visit her. Look at her fading pictures. Listen to her same old stories. Ask her to tell you about your mama.

Bake some cookies. Eat some dough.

Make a list.

Scratch a dog.

Fold the towels. Load the dishwasher.

Wander around an old cemetery. Find the person who lived the longest. And the briefest.

Catch a patch of sunshine. Feel it warm on your skin. Close your eyes.

Pick some flowers. Pull some weeds.

Paint your toenails (or at least clip them).

Write a thank-you note.

Take a long, hot bath.

Pour cold, iced tea into a jelly glass. Sip it in the bathtub.

Hold hands.

Fry some bacon in an iron skillet.

Poke around a junk shop.

Watch The Andy Griffith Show, preferably an episode with Ernest T. Bass. (“I’m a little mean, but I make up for it by being REAL healthy!”)

Buy a new coloring book and a fresh box of Crayola crayons, not cheap ones.

Pray without ceasing.

Count your blessings.