At the end of Barbara Brown Taylor’s book Leaving Church: A Memoir of Faith, the author lists a number of things that are “saving her life right now” – intuitive, instrumental and illuminating things that are life-giving in organic and maybe unorthodox ways – a little different to what she conventionally taught from the pulpit for years as an Episcopalian minister. Things like: teaching at a college, living in relationship with creation, and encountering God in other people.

At the end of every one of her podcasts, Jen Hatmaker borrows this same question to ask her guests – What is saving your life right now? – and the answers are not usually spiritual or abstract. More often what is saving someone’s life right now are ordinary things like reading a poem a day, eating ripe in-season strawberries or watching the latest Brian Regan special on Netflix.

I thought about this last night when I donned my eye mask before going to sleep. It’s usually still light outside when we hit the hay in this house and all the sleep-gurus strongly suggest that when it comes to sleeping better, darkness is your friend. I’m not that great of a sleeper these days – at least not during the second half of the night when my water habit wakes me up. It took me awhile to get used to it, but I think my eye mask is saving my life right now, helping me to get back to sleep a little quicker than usual.

But then, when I wake up in the morning, coffee is saving my life right now. Well, really, coffee has been saving my life for a long time, since I starting making cups of milky instant Nescafe to help me study for final exams in grade twelve. However, I sometimes get a little overzealous in my coffee habit and it becomes more of a havoc-maker than a life-saver. A visit to a doctor a few months ago instigated a stint on a very strict hypoallergenic diet to identify any foods which were causing my post-menopausal body more grief than they were worth. Happily – and maybe the reason I was able to sign on to such austerity – was that I could still drink my beloved coffee. But only two cups a day. It turned out to be such a good thing, because I’ve returned to the delight of really relishing those two cups, so much more so than the 4 or 5 I was glugging down.

Walking in the morning is saving my life right now. I love walking year-round but in the summer, there’s nothing so wonderful as being able to walk out the door in the early morning, knowing I’ll be greeted in sound and scene by all the friendly flora and fauna that love the early mornings, too. (Of course, there are some enemies as well: swooping gulls and rumors of bears in the park – but I’ve learned to avoid their usual hangouts.) And during our record-breaking “heat-snap” last week, morning was the only time that a long walk was tolerable.

Intermittent fasting is saving my life right now. Or I.F. to those in the club. For those of you not yet inducted, it simply means waiting a little longer than usual before you eat your first meal of the day. For me that is anywhere from 10 to noon for a total of 14 to 16 hours without food. (I do get to have my first cup of coffee because I drink it black during this window.) It cuts down my calorie intake for the day a little, which is good since Mother Nature decided that older women need to burn less. This doesn’t help when you’re used to eating three squares a day. Plus snacks. Plus dessert. Plus plus. I.F. has given me some reins to pull on the horse I call my appetite and by the time I do eat “break-fast”, I feel hungry and a good-emptiness in my tummy.

And, of course, reading (as always) is saving my life right now, but more specifically: reading other writer’s journals. So far I’ve read May Sarton’s Journal of a Solitude and I’m over halfway through Madeleine L’Engle’s four-book Crosswicks Journals. Both women were writing from “about my age” in these journals, contending with everything from a raccoon who regularly breaks into the house every night (Sarton) to a mother’s last visit and then death at Crosswicks (L’Engle). And all the while, they were trying to keep up with the business of writing and managing a household, while also not getting as much sleep as they would have liked because of raucous raccoons and aged mothers. It’s a good reminder of the quote that “everyone is fighting a hard battle.” But in the midst of the battles are loveable grandchildren and velvety donkeys, burgeoning gardens and restful walks to the stream: things that were saving their lives right then.

It’s also a good reminder that it’s the little things that really make that difference. What’s saving your life right now?