Questions of Order

Illness grabbed me suddenly in the afternoon of July 17. For the next three days my temperature floated between 100 and 103+. My world narrowed. Hour by day, my body, my bed, my room defined me.

Better now, I look back at how established household order embraced and supported me in my extremity. After I'd managed to follow the orderly routine of a daily wash-up-- sitting rather than standing in the shower, trusting previous cleanings; blindly finding and applying shampoo and soap, rinsing, every movement intentional, effortful-- I found towels in their dependable place. Likewise clean underwear, and an easy, established collection place for dirty laundry. Others in the household knew where food would predictably be stored; those others knew and stepped into food preparation routines.

Our utility services are established, bills paid, so without further action our services continued. Established order kept the house cool around my fever. Fresh, clean, miraculous water continued to flow. The phones worked.

I've mentioned to others how I noticed that we support the creation of order around ourselves and then when things go badly that created order supports us.

In each case, the individual to whom I spoke disagreed vigorously at first:
We don't have to be very orderly to function.
Too much order tips into obsessive compulsive disorder.
Change is the only dependable reality, we need to learn to lean into change instead of depending on some temporary, fleeting, created order.

And then, each one who disagreed went on to speak in praise of the the specific kinds of order she'd established in her own life, ordinary routines that became supportive routines.

I watch on the tv pictures of refugees who now stream out of Somalia, escaping failed agriculture, failed politics. Refugees of every era have lost the order that supported them. Then each detail of living becomes a struggle. Only the strong survive.

It occurs to me that our government creates an overarching societal order. We each depend on it. Have you yet begun to ponder what you will lose if our representatives cannot maintain the long established order on which we've depended?

Are we engaged in a national seismic economic shift, and only the strong will survive?