Jam Calendar

As I find myself winding down the last days of my work year before the holiday, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by a few last-minute wins that have stacked up in the final days of 2020. It’s rewarding to see your work translate into meaningful action, and that’s something that’s been hard to feel over the course of the last year even though for me, the work itself has never ceased.

Through all of the chaos and the world busting apart at the seams in so many different and impossible-seeming ways, work has been my constant. With nowhere to go and not even a commute to distract me, I settled into a daily routine of hours on hours clocked in my office, getting work done. I didn't take any days off because there was nowhere to go, and when there is nowhere to go, the work is going to be there with you whether you want it to be or not. And so I leaned into it, and I did the work, and as we head into 2021 — a year that, if we're being honest, is absolutely also going to be a shitshow — I have to admit that it's the work that's made the year worth surviving in the first place.

Yes, there is more to the world than work, but hasn't it also felt like work sometimes to find those small joys seeping through the cracks of the news cycle? Haven't you felt sometimes like you've had to take a deep breath and put on a thicker skin and get ready to wade through the muck in order to find something that feels good?

And yet, when you find those things — or better, when they smack you in the face with the ease that you deserve — you're able to hold onto them for just a bit longer or enjoy them more than you probably previously could have. This year, knowing that I was going to end up spending Christmas the way that I spent Thanksgiving (and, well, the eight months prior), I decided I was going to need to manufacture a bit more holiday joy than would ordinarily be necessary, and I got an advent calendar. I did my research pretty thoroughly, too, trying to decide what would best check the box of my interests. I don't really eat chocolate or candy much, so I looked at fancy beauty calendars and candle calendars and cheese calendars and whiskey calendars and that weird Tiffany & Co. calendar that's a million dollars but is basically full of tiny baby spoons. 

None of them sounded right.

I don't remember how I ended up finding it, but the advent calendar that I ended up buying was only $30, and it is perfect. It contains 24 tiny jars of different flavors of Bonne Maman jam, and it reminds me both of being a child and of fancy room service breakfasts all at once. Every morning this month, I have opened the little cardboard door to find my jam flavor — fig and cardamom! raspberry lychee! orange peach marmalade! — and every afternoon, I've enjoyed that flavor on a slice of sourdough bread as a snack. I've spooned some jams onto chicken as part of a marinade, I've used it in cocktails in the place of simple syrup and a cherry, and I've cleaned and saved all the tiny jars for use in freezing compound butters, mixing skincare potions, and mixing spices in. You can recycle your joy, if you try hard enough.

Here is a short list of other things that brought me real, lasting joy in 2020, in the hopes that perhaps they might bring you joy too. 

1. The Meaning of Mariah Carey. For some reason, people always think I'm being tongue in cheek when I say things like "Oh my god, Jessica Simpson's memoir is really great!" I am not. It really was. But Jessica Simpson's memoir was also just a tad too dark for me to enter into the joy column for y'all, and while Mariah Carey's story has its share of challenges, she is also someone who has spent her entire life trying to architect joy for herself, and there is nothing better than reading Mariah Carey on how Christmas makes her feel.

2. Steve Nash coaching the Brooklyn Nets. On the day that you receive this, it will be the first day of the 2020-21 NBA season, and man, if you care even ambiently about sports — or if you're really into physical arts, like dance — you should watch a Brooklyn Nets game. That team is going to have so much fun this year, and I am incredibly biased but they're a joy to watch, and when I think about Steve Nash as a former player and as a person in general I think about how much he just really seems to enjoy life. I can't imagine how much fun he's having coaching this team already. Also, I love listening to people who really love something talk about that thing (unless that thing is Guided by Voices.) 

3. The "I wonder what's inside your butthole" kid. This one is a throwback to our earlier days in quarantine, but those of you who aren't Relentlessly Online may have missed it (if you didn't, as it happens, it still holds up). This video is just the perfect storm of what happens when your kids have spent way too long at home and also are just genuinely curious and creative people who want to know what's inside your butthole. This song is catchy! 

4. Fiona Apple, Fetch the Bolt Cutters. What an incredible gift Fiona gave us out the gate as we were buckling up to try to survive this year. Every interview she did about this record is real and raw and somehow fulfilling as hell; every song on this album is the same. It's the perfect album for the world we are living in, and for me personally it's been the one I've turned to most often when I shut my laptop after a work day and walk into my kitchen to start "my personal life" for the evening. I have cooked so many meals this year accompanied by Fiona; this album is the soundtrack to the chopping of vegetables and the roasting of chickens and the boiling of pasta water and the loading of the dishwasher, and also of long weekend afternoon singalongs and living room dances when there's too much nervous energy to be contained.

5. This Twitter thread about a woman who pretended to be a fairy all summer to brighten a little girl and her family's days. It is more involved and more pure and more good than any of us deserve and I will carry it with me in my heart forever.

6. The Ask Molly newsletter. Heather Havrilesky is one hell of a writer, and her Ask Molly newsletter is the evil twin to her very well known and uplifting Ask Polly column for The Cut. Ask Molly is not for the faint of heart; it is is dark as hell, and it is real and it is cutting and I have to tell you, sometimes it is a joy to just dwell in the dark spaces when you really need to. 

7. And finally, I will leave you with a recipe that brings me more joy than the sum of its parts every Christmas — the one I will be cooking as part of my family's Christmas Eve celebration, because we may be apart this year but we will all be eating the same comfort foods together. I hope everyone is having a safe holiday season and that you are grabbing every little bit of joy that you can find. 

Meatball Appetizers From the Kitchen of Debbie Fulton — (Makes about 34)

Meatball Ingredients 1 lb ground beef2 tsp Worcestershire sauce1 envelope Lipton's Dry Onion Soup Mix2/3 cup evaporated milk

Sauce Ingredients2 cups ketchup1 Tbs Worcestershire sauce1 cup brown sugar 

Preparation: Mix Worcestershire sauce and milk, add meat and soup mix, and stir well. Shape into balls and cook in a large skillet until browned, about 10-12 minutes. Drain any excess fat.

Mix sauce ingredients in a large saucepan (or, if you want to keep the meatballs warmed, a slow cooker.) Cook on low heat, stirring constantly, for about 10 minutes. Add meatballs to sauce, and stir.

You’re reading “Soup and Despair,” a weekly newsletter by Sarah Flynn and Rebecca Orchant. It’s about food, feelings, and surviving the dark times. If someone forwarded you this email, it’s because they love you and they want you to eat. You can subscribe to it too!