Breaking my ankle just over a month after having a stroke in July (I’m now in the company of luminaries like Lucinda Williams, John Fetterman, Hailey Bieber and Kid Cudi), means it's an ongoing challenge to put on a happy face. Even during the best of times, I've had an unfortunate tendency to project into the future with possibilities, pitfalls, and potential catastrophes, especially at 2am when I feel spiritually undernourished. After a recent gloomy night, I was bowled over by discovering a wonderful poem by Ron Padgett called “How to Be Perfect,” and one of the verses has become my new mantra:“Don't be afraid of anything beyond your control. Don't be afraid, for instance, that the building will collapse as you sleep, or that someone you love will suddenly drop dead.” It doesn’t always work, because I can be a bitter bitch and a big baby when I dwell on spending three more weeks in a (non walking) cast. That’s when I turn to creature comforts to entice me out of bed: ordering new shoes for the day I can wear both of them at same time; buying a piece of clothing I don’t need but really want; starting a book I’ve been saving for a treat. What helps you face the day when you'd rather burrow under the blankets and tune out the world? Suggestions welcome.

Every now and then a gossipy movie-star bio (Cary Grant!) or shallow celebrity memoir is just what I need to turn off the doomy chyron that runs through my brain. I’m getting ready to listen to Like a Rolling Stone by Jann Wenner, which promises lots of juicy, irrelevant revelations. (PS: One of my daughters has a tiny cameo in Box of Rain, the recent documentary about Grateful Dead fans  – rock and roll from the Deadhead point of view, rentable on Amazon.) 

I’ve been obsessed with finding a long Victorian tux top like this one from The Great to wear with a cropped sweater. After three weeks of pajamas, t-shirts and sweatpants, I feel bedraggled beyond belief. I spend a lot of time dreaming of dressing in something other than pants with one leg chopped off to accommodate a cast.

I only have one foot that will fit in a shoe right now, so splurging on pink shearling flip-flops from Olu Kai seems pointless. But maybe they’d be an incentive for getting through this with less whining. They remind me of the pink satin slippers trimmed with swans-down that I had as a little girl. I like to think I was addicted to glamour at an early age.

When all else fails, I draw on memories of my Aunt Dot who died at 98 and who seemed the epitome of glamour when I was a little girl. She never moved from the small Kentucky town where I grew up, but she started and ran several businesses, outlived three husbands, traveled the world, and lived on her own almost until the end. In between, she had serious illnesses and extended hospital stays, but she never lost her optimism or curiosity. I adored her, and when I'm tempted to turn over and go back to sleep, I try to live up to my Dot DNA instead.