An ideal day to help leave worry behind

A perfect day for me begins like this: I sit on my small balcony, surrounded by a garden of potted plants. I call it “my garden” because its size fits into my life. Because when the morning light lays itself over the plants so that the new growth sparkles brighter than the undergrowth, for about 15 shining minutes I don’t think about anything except what is most important to me, and that’s the definition of a garden. Because leaving worry behind is not easy for me and never has been.

For years, I’ve wanted to give up worry. I’m willing but barely succeeding. Some days I think that I am getting there, that I’m there .

Because the woman who worried about things (so many things!) beyond her control isn’t me anymore. She’s become someone who relaxes in her garden before she goes to work, and this may seem a small thing, but it’s huge . She’s become someone who can finally spot the red flags and not ignore them, thank god, or try to call them something else.

So here’s what I do after I sit in my garden: I sit at my desk.

And after three to four hours of working out what I want to say by finding the words for how, I start to fidget because I want to get to the public pool before it closes for lap swimming. And if I get a lane to myself, it’s a perfect day indeed. I’m not great at sharing my swimming space. I don’t know if its because writing is such a solitary endeavor and it’s hard to make the transition, but when I see two, three, people sharing a lane by swimming in a tight circle I think, you’d have to shoot me first .

But honestly, the best part of a perfect day is still to come: I go to the movies.

More specifically, I go to the Historic Lynwood Theatre. It’s out past Fort Ward in Lynwood Center, which can sound like a bustling place, but everyone, I mean everyone , who lives around here knows it is not. It’s more of a sunny, social place for meeting a friend. Which, when you think about it on an island like Bainbridge, means it is a bustling place.

The feel of the Lynwood is so different from new theaters. Maybe it’s the lack of fake butter smell. Maybe it’s because the movie posters at the Lynwood tell a story that began in 1936. Definitely it’s because the films don’t bore me. I like to sit in the dark and get lost in the story.

I also like Kevin, the manager.

Kevin knows films. For him, the title, yes, the year it was made, yes, the reviews, yes, the director, the actors, the location, yes, yes, yes ― how his movie mind works! And he always manages to be cheerful even when he’s concerned. But something in his tone yesterday sounded more concerned than ever and it makes me wonder...

Because more than once I’ve had the entire theater to myself lately. And that breaks my heart. I mean, I get that you can buy a TV screen the size of Rhode Island and download one of a gazillion movies at home, so why go out?

I’ll tell you why. When you make the effort to support something so genuine, it’s as if you can feel the point of living on an island all the way through.

A few movies ago, when Kevin was splashing my popcorn with butter ― real butter, that’s how great the Lynnwood is ― another woman refused butter for hers. Butter, she said, is just one of those things she doesn’t tempt herself with. So I said―as if it were a dare, which we both know it wasn’t―that I bet she could enjoy butter at the movies and still respect herself in the morning. After the movie, we walked across the street to Earth & Vine and got to know each other a little better.

Is this any way to meet people in this day and age?

Yes, it is.

Because this kind connection doesn’t usually happen in your living room with Netflix, no matter how many other devices you are monitoring.

I have one other friend who loves to go to the movies as much as I do. And like Kevin, Diane remembers everything. We usually go to another historic theater, the Egyptian in Seattle, because she lives in the city and thinks Bainbridge is in another galaxy. She says things like, “you live in a bubble.” In a way she is right. Islands are a bubble. But even so, she lives on the tippy top of Queen Anne Avenue ― is that any less a bubble?

Diane thinks it is nothing, all this remembering. But for me, it’s mission accomplished if I even recall the title. I remember a conversation between us back in March. After I quoted something I’d read about Ash Wednesday, “Soon enough, every one of us, and everything, will turn to dust,” Diane said, “except plastic.” And that’s a perfect comeback, don’t you think, on a perfect day?

After the movie, on the ferry back to the island, I often have a sudden desire to call someone, but I wait for the impulse to pass because the call will just break up over the sound ― the abrupt silence a bad connection both literally and within. Most of the time I just stare out the window because there’s not much else you can do on a ferry and, besides, it’s is an ideal end to a perfect day I am lucky enough to enjoy now and again.

Mary Lou Sanelli's new collection of essays about living in the Northwest, In So Many Words, is due out in September. Please join her for a launch celebration (champagne!) at Eagle Harbor Book Co. on September 12th at 6:30 pm. www.marylousanelli.com .

This article originally appeared on Kitsap Sun: An ideal day to help leave worry behind