This post is just for my friend Steve….the bassplayer. Now, of course, Steve Lawson certainly does not fit this particular description. He’s the coolest bass player. ever.
not even kidding.
I just like this clip though, remembered from my youth.
everyday we either choose life or death.
think of this for just a moment-
every choice you make
and each word you choose to speak
and each thought you have…
these are all either choices
to live or to die
to build or to tear down
to breathe or to suffocate
today, when you find yourself
lost in your own worry
in your own distress
ask yourself which choice
you want to make
and let that inform you
let that speak loudest.
I feel as though all my life I’ve been trying to “get organized” or “get it together” and frankly I had this startling vision of myself at 80 just as unorganized and wacky as I am today and I felt weirdly OK with that. The old woman I see in the future though is content with who she is rather than aiming toward being someone she can never be.
That’s a comforting thought.
What is interesting is this. I actually don’t mind the struggle right now. I doubt, too, that I’ll ever stop TRYING to be more organized. It’s hard to explain but I’ll give it a shot.
I have this idea that when I’m old one of the best parts of sitting around and talking will be my kids telling the stories of all the organizer racks I purchased, all the talks that started with, “Ok, so from NOW ON…here’s how we’re doing it” and all the calendars and print outs and sticker charts that sat woefully on the bulletin board looking lonely.
As much as I’d love to bask in the contentment of who I am, warts and all, right now…I think that part of my charm (ahem) IS the fact that I struggle with it. I do like myself. I do like how laid back I am and honestly, if I didn’t have children I’d probably not struggle with it…but since I DO have people I am responsible for, I guess I’m also content with the struggle.
Maybe the key is to just be in the struggle, to know it at sight and to chip away at it knowing it as a Sisyphisian task rather than try to pretend that:
a)I’ll get the rock to the top of the hill and then I’ll be someone else thus ending that struggle
or
b)I’ll leave the freakin’ rock at the bottom of the hill.
The truth is that we’re all rolling a rock up the hill every day til we die. We just all have different names for it. One day, maybe I’ll rename my rock something besides “need to be more organized” but I’ll roll it up anyway, calling it something new and feeling it just as familiar in weight.
We held a writer’s workshop here last weekend with my very talented friend Ahna leading the pack. It was, dare I say, AWESOME? Yes, I dare. It was. She rocks.
One of our exercises was writing a poem inspired in part by William Carlos Williams’ “This is just to say.” The theme for the workshop being creative writing a la missives.
So I thought I’d take a moment and share my work from that day.
finding
i was wondering
when i saw
that photo
on your unmade bed
which box
had been opened
and how far
you had to reach
inside
to retrieve this.
only then
i realized
the photo was me
by the cliffs
hair blowing
in the wind
eyes squinting
in the sun
arms open
to the world
metaphorfrom the Latin. metaphora, from Gk. metaphora "a transfer," especially of the sense of one word to a different word, lit. "a carrying over," from metapherein "transfer, carry over," from meta- "over, across" (see meta-) + pherein "to carry, bear" (see infer).
metaphor
from the Latin. metaphora, 
