Hedonistic displeasure

My husband is away for two weeks on a business trip, which means I have the whole house to myself. It also means I have a ton of time to just be, without being distracted by another person.

Quickly, I’ve adopted new habits, like sleeping downstairs on my Arab/Turkish floor cushions, with the window open to the night air. Setting up a classic movie every night (my favorite is Another Man’s Poison starring Bette Davis, 1951) as I settle in for bed. This is a touch different to when I’m not alone, where my habits naturally include another person’s presence in my life.

Today, I was bored out of my mind. I met up with a friend once this week for dinner, but other than that, my human interaction has been limited to sitting in a Turkish cafe, writing, and texting friends and family.

After my morning writing session, where I found myself tired and frustrated, and deciding not to force myself to write just to “get my chapters done,” I considered going shopping, anywhere, for anything, just to have something to do. And yet, I could not think of a single place to go, or a single thing to buy, not even my local indie bookshop.

Now, normally, I’m not a big shopper, except for books, and normally I’m a homebody. Alone, though, I find I’m even less a shopper, and more a homebody, the latter of which is a touch worrying to me, but alas.

In the past, I’ve noticed an uptick in my spending and shopping when spring rolls by, an urge to “go shopping,” which ends up with packages dropped at my door. This year, the urge is nonexistent. And the thought of shopping has me…uninterested. Like the appeal has died for me, for whatever reason, and even the thought, where once before, would drive a certain level of pleasure, no longer holds that for me.

So, shopping feeling dull and unsatisfying, I ended up driving on the Virginia Hallowed Ground highway, or at least, I think that’s what I was driving for a while based on a sign I came across. I’ve been doing this for years, getting in the car and driving aimlessly as I settle my mind. It worked for a bit, but when I returned home, the boredom settled back, a restlessness that wouldn’t let go. Even reading didn’t feel like the thing I needed, even though I’m currently reading a book I’m very much enjoying.

I texted my husband and mother to complain how bored I was, only to shortly thereafter find myself outside, puttering around in my garden. I was tilling fresh dirt with my hands, flooding a pot with water and soaking the soil in it as I transferred tomato plants into it, while setting up a new section of my garden to plant turmeric and ginger.

Within minutes, my restlessness settled. The sun on my skin (solar urticaria be damned) and the smell of water in the soil, my hands in the dirt, made all the difference.

I returned inside my house to cook dinner, check on my homemade vanilla extract I just set up, and to start a new jar of fermented lemons —all things that involve me working with my hands.

Which brings me to something I’ve noticed quite a bit in the last few months: working with my hands has been rather calming.

The research shows this, of course, the use of our hands and the feel of textures in them, is important for brain and emotional health. And yet, I have rarely bothered with my hands as an adult. It’s only after making some key life changes last year that I’ve had a chance to figure out who I am without some identifiers I used to carry about myself. And I’m surprised at how much I enjoy doing thing manually.

Last night, also out of boredom, I ended up baking green olive bread and maamoul. In fact, I have been craving the use of my hands, considering several times purchasing clay to make a few pottery pieces. When I think of the clay, I don’t imagine necessarily the end result, but the feel of the clay in between my fingers — and it’s this sensualness that piques my interest rather than the final product.

And the entirety of the week, I’ve been cooking far more than I usually do, taking the time to chop up the onions and garlic, grate the ginger and turmeric, season the meat, mixing it in, squeezing the lemon juice. I find myself unhurried, enjoying the feel in my hands, against my skin. And because I’m a late sleeper, I’m doing this all past 8pm, taking up part of the night to move into a slower rhythm.

It’s interesting for me to notice all things, and I can’t help but wonder whether my uptick in my use of my hands has led to a decrease in purchasing and shopping, or vice versa. Either way, it begs the question: when we create things for ourselves, even if it’s olive bread, does the dopamine we get from that outweigh any we get from external pleasures, like a new sweater bought and hung up in our closet?

I have to consider whether the joy I find in making things, in using my hands, is allowing me to see through the artificiality of buying things, and the hedonic treadmill associated with it. Or, if not see through that artificiality, certainly derive no pleasure from it.

This doesn’t upset me; quite the opposite. I used to wonder whether spending the day typing, or in other words, “using my hands” constituted the use of hands in the neuroscientific sense. But I don’t think it does.

What I’m learning is that using our hands requires more than just bending our fingers over keys; it requires the contortions and mechanics of our fingers, our wrists, our hands as a whole, and I do think textures and temperatures and other sensory elements are a requisite. It’s not enough to simply use our fingers; we must use our hands.

All this to say: I’m noticing these two weeks I’m alone and having to sit with myself, by myself, that I’m naturally being drawn to using my body more, to inviting my hands back into my life. And I’m noticing that in doing so, I’m inviting joy into my life, or at least, banishing boredom, even when the things I am doing are slower and not necessarily “exciting.” It’s like I’m making my own dopamine, instead of buying it.