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| View Out the Back Window of the Orono Public Library |
Saturday night, back home, I shared a section of my morning pages with my husband Scott. He suggested that I post it here. He wondered how others might respond to my words, which seemed to him more alive than my usual "crafted" writing.
So tonight, with the results of the Iowa caucuses unknown and the President yet to be acquitted, I'm sitting here determined to share that morning pages section. If I had to call it anything, I'd quote Coleridge and call it "Water, Water, Everywhere." Prepare ye to be jerked from sea to shining river--the mind can do that. I will break it into paragraphs and occasionally clarify parts that need it. Here goes.
"And as I write the date on this page [February 1, 2020], I realize that in addition to crossing a river [which I'll do later this morning], I'm also crossing into a new month, and I'm thinking back to the beginning of January that was so fully consumed by my parents' health issues that I didn't even put up my 2020 calendar until January 6 (or even the 7th): there was just no time even to think about it.
"Epiphany. The epiphany was that it was a new year, a new beginning, and I didn't even have the time to appreciate that I was, theoretically, crossing a new threshold; was, theoretically, standing at the edge of a fresh start; was, theoretically, poised at a kind of new beginning. The epiphany was that I could let a new beginning slip by. Wait: it was that I don't think that I trust new beginnings anymore.
"I used to really believe in, put a lot of stock in, new beginnings; I used to think that I could capitalize on those borders, thresholds, vantage points that I imbued with symbolism and motivational potential. But if it's one thing I've learned this past year, it's how so many of the symbols I've embraced, in part because I hoped the mindfulness and consciousness of them would inspire me and mark my being more free, were nothing but sandbags against the tide.
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Housatonic River flood; Ashley Falls, MA* |
"Because more than anything, it's not about avoiding the water. It's about keeping one's feet and clothing dry, about carrying one's valuables safely across it, about navigating it respectfully, even appreciatively, without drowning in it. . . .
"But there's so much water these days . . . there needs to be an effort to fight back. If I do nothing, I get swallowed up and I drown, but if I try too hard to fight it, I expend all this energy, get exhausted, and drown anyway. No, there has to be some analogy to how you swim when you get carried away by a rip current. You can't swim directly toward the shore; the wisdom is that you swim parallel to the shore, not at it. But what happens then? I'm not sure. . . . But what I do know is . . . that strategy is needed. Endurance is needed. It needs to be a smart effort, because as Lipsha Morrissey says in Love Medicine, "we live on dry land."
So there you have my morning pages passage. No more symbols, no more feel-good but ultimately hollow assignments of meaning to phenomena that parse time and space. Just an acknowledgment of so much water and some wise swimming and waded needed. Just a hope . . .. There are such things as houseboats; there are ways to live on water. And yes, I see that with those houseboats, I'm back to manufacturing metaphors and symbols that just might float my boat.
* https://www.flickr.com/photos/allisonac/2329645640/
** Yes, I know I'm mixing all kinds of water imagery; that happens in morning pages. I probably should have said beach, not flood plain.
Hi Joan, That was some good advice that Scott gave you. I like seeing this more raw form of writing and that you've allowed your thoughts and feelings to just flow (to extend your metaphor). Your metaphor and the image of the river overflowing its banks brings to mind so many instances and images of the aftermath of the extreme weather we are seeing around the world. I find myself wondering about why caring for elderly parents in this day and age feels so unsustainable, in a way that I don't think it did in previous generations. Is it because we are doing it as isolated nuclear families in a hyper-medicalized and consumerist society. Anyway, I find this metaphor evocative.
ReplyDeleteHi, Melissa--Your observations about extreme weather and extreme elder care are really interesting--gotta think about that. Your observation that elder care seems more unsustainable and therefore problematic in this day and age really got me thinking--because I really don't know if it feels different to me today and than it might/would have 40 years ago. Would I have been less determined to do something in my life besides being responsive to my parents and their needs? How different would my parents' old ages have been 40 years ago, and what would that have meant for me? Your word "hypermedicalized" really resonated with me--I spend so much time driving too and from CVS; I'd love to talk to you about how more "consumerism" might affect all of this. Thanks for giving me so much to think about, Melissa!
ReplyDeleteA friend of mine sent me the following comment by email because she couldn't figure out how to post it here. She gave me permission to post it here on her behalf:
ReplyDeleteI really had one of those "water" days yesterday with my mother-in-law—and . . . I just got so kind of overwhelmed and discombobulated by it. (a more and more oft occurring feeling of agitation)
One of the ways that I was trying to "swim to shore" was trying to stick to my plans that included grocery shopping and dinner making even though my mother-in-law’s doctor's appointment had gone so late and been so tough (don't worry - everything is fine). . . But before I went right back out to do a round of errands at rush hour, I stopped in to talk to my daughter, and she said, forget the grocery store, order pizza. And that was good advice. It gave me some breathing space and helped me calm that frantic busy part of me. I probably should have tried to do some centering prayer or something - but yesterday pizza worked pretty well. I still had to go to the drug store, and I still made my mother-in-law some mashed potatoes. . . but in the meantime I had moved to a state that was a little less driven by unnecessary agenda items and more by what was actually needful. I could wait in line at Walgreens with patience and gratitude and enjoy the fresh air as I walked home.
I read what I've written and it seems so trivial - but I'm trying to remind myself that wise folks have said that there is nothing trivial about that pause and that re-ordering - however small.
It also makes me think about how often the Divine in my life - that which I think I should be praying to/tuning in to/centering on - speaks to me through important people in my life . . because I can't seem to remember to go to the Source. But the Source is always there anyway.
And I'm thinking about new beginnings. I constantly need to begin again, begin again. But January 1 or February 1 are so artificial and frankly irrelevant to what I need to be beginning over and over again. They are external drivers - like my plans make a particular dinner or go to the grocery store - that can add more pressure and anxiety rather than the mindfulness I need. So thank you for sharing that epiphany.
Thank you so much for letting me share this, Anonymous Friend!
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