Samantha Libby
Accomplishments
Yesterday the county sent a flyer in the mail. There are too many deer in the woods behind our house so they will be conducting operations—between the hours of 11 p.m. and 3 a.m.—to cull the population. Today I go for a walk and I see the offending deer. They stand just a few feet away from me. They look at me. They have not been taught to fear humans. They are waiting patiently to be shot. I go back home and lie in bed and think, Well, what have I accomplished?
I baked the sourdough bread. I also learned how to make my hair look good—almost. I’d been meaning to do that. I bought candles and read books that had piled up around my home. I lost my job. I applied to another job and lost it before I even started. I made needle-felted animals and lined them up on my shelves. The fox seems to survey the others in its pack with disdain. Do you think this is an achievement?
I got a new job—sort of. It’s a trial run. That’s what they told me anyway.
My partner’s grandmother calls from the nursing home. She wants to say goodbye. We think it is going to be quick, but it turns into quite a conversation. For some reason, that night I lie in bed and think of all the people who hurt me, in great detail.
It could have been family, work, or religion. Not me. The self-help book says I’ve got an “enemy-centered life focus.”
My friend loses her husband. He doesn’t die. He just leaves. She doesn’t even cry. She just asks me: What have I been doing with my life?
I put seeds in a planter and watch things grow. I stand in the woods and think, What if? I could get lost out here. When you are buried, you become part of the earth. I could become a tree. I could grow into something that people like to look at. I have long ago given up on my hair.
My dog still looks at me like everything’s going to be okay. Just around the corner, she seems to say. Just one more block. Don’t turn around. I don’t want to go home yet.
I join an online group where we sing together. My computer mic is bad, but something happens in the translation of all our sounds. It’s that inflated feeling you get, like singing in the shower—this isn’t so bad. But a piece of you still wonders what someone is thinking on the other side of the wall.
My neighbors are taken away in an ambulance and do not return. Nobody knows what happened. The driveway is still empty. I miss the sound of their bottles emptying each week into the trash can. The man is—or was, I do not know—ninety-one years old. He did everything very slowly so I could hear each and every clank. I could tell he took a lot of pride in that chore, like that was his thing he did for his wife. He took care of things. He could be relied upon.
I stand with a crowd so thick our bodies touch. It is very intimate and strangers weep with one another. We cry out with arms raised: This is what democracy looks like! Then the crowd retreats and I see people put signs in their yards and we make more bread and I think, Is it?
I move. I have to move. I don’t have a job, not a real one, but I have to move because I just have to. I have to accomplish something. It is unclear why this is important. But it is, so I move to a place where the back wall of the house is missing and there is no kitchen but it’s okay, because now there is something to do and I will have to do it for a very long time.
Now, when I read, I do so very slowly and with great effort. Briefly, I am in someone else’s sorrows. Then I close the pages and fall asleep. My garden dies because it is cold outside.
My dog still looks at me like everything is going to be okay.
I drive. I drive the entire beltway loop over and over again and watch as people enter and exit and enter and exit. I drive to the ocean. I see pelicans move in and out of the horizon and the waves and the line that separates the sky from the sea and I watch the moon rise and I see the stars and I am jealous because it seems so easy for them, but if I am honest, I could be that simple too. I press my feet into the sand and make a castle around them. The walls are surprisingly strong against the waves.
I go a day without sleeping in the middle of it and I am very proud of this.
The résumé builder says to give specific examples of your accomplishments. If you can quantify them, it will go better for you. But all I have are words.
I receive a critique on my writing from someone who once pretended to love me. He has no red pen, so instead he writes: Delete, please.
I never knew a comma could be cruel, that it could anchor you to the ground. I lie in bed and think of all the people who hurt me in great detail.
My country burns and my country dances. My country is under water. My country is offering hope, to the highest bidder.
I sit by the bird feeder. I see all kinds of nuthatches and juncos and vireos and woodpeckers go by. A book I purchased states that most animals must keep busy all day long in order to survive.
Someone asks me if I am okay, and I genuinely answer: Sometimes. This answer pleases them. But I want them to ask: What did you do today? I want to tell them that truth. But I am at the point where no one expects anything from me anymore.
Night comes. I look around and think, Now what?
I think about looking for the owl I spotted last week. My book says it is a barred owl. You can tell what it is by its call: Whoooo—whoooo—who looks for yooooou?
Outside, I can see the brief sparks of flashlights illuminating the boots of the hunters.