Where I’m Not
I hear a lot of talk these days about “being in the moment.” About living *now*. About mindfulness. I hear admonishments from others to live conciously — in the present. Some of this talk is sincere and born out of a desire for something deeper, something more than Walmart and McDonald’s and SUVs. Some of it is glib psychobabble. But glib or sincere, living in the present moment of my life is something I would very much like to do.
On days when I am feeling particularly delusional, I will tell you that I am a person who lives in the now, or at least someone who strives towards that kind of conscious living. But a lot of the time, that is a complete lie. On days when I am feeling brutally honest, I will admit to you that I live the vast majority of my life about 127 miles into the future. I am seldom paying attention to where I am right now, and am forever thinking of where I will be tomorrow — or where I won’t be. My monkey brain spits out a constant litany of thoughts that tell me I will surely be happy if I can only get over there. Then I get there and there becomes here and it starts all over again.
This week we got some disappointing news. Or more accurately, we received more disappointing bits in a long string of disappointing news. But the final piece came on Thursday, and it seems the other proverbial shoe has now dropped. We are not waiting anymore. There is no there, only here. And this moment is asking me what I am going to do with it. I chose to cry for awhile, be angry a little, or rather a lot, actually. And I can do that with that moment, but each succesive moment I encounter asks the same question. What are you going to do with me?
I think I may be getting tired of living where I’m not.
I finished the hood on Rogue. I bound off the top and it was beautiful. The back, however proved to be trickier than I was prepared for and you know that sickening feeling when several stitches get away from you in an area that is more complicated than merely picking up a few dropped stitches? I labored for hours trying to get it back, but in the end, it had only gotten worse and looked like this:
The guts of unravelled knitting is a disheartening sight. Ultimately, I had to rip back 17 rows of work, which I did last night. It looks fine now and I have nearly made up for all my undoing. I imagine I will finish the hood this weekend and get a good start on the sleeves.
April 18th, 2005 at 9:06 am
England is amazing!!!! And your Rogue looks amazing!!!! I can’t wait to see it in person. Hope this are going well at home! See you when I get back!!!
April 19th, 2005 at 5:48 am
Sister, I know ALL about shoes dropping! Here’s to running on the extra legs of hope and inspiration to keep you moving forward in spite of it all! Whatever it is, you will get through it and come out on top - or at least better and richer as a person because of the experience! Wisdom is hard-earned. It doesn’t seem worth the work while you are going through, but it sure is nice to have afterwords!
Disappointment is the spirit worlds way of saying, “We see something fabulous coming your way, and we are going to do what we can to stop it before you gather it all unto yourself!” Just tell it to F-Off and overcome anyway!
I used to counsel with a couple who had a very deep and direct connection to the things of the unseen world. Whenever something really bad would happen they would say, “That’s GREAT! It means something really wonderful is about to happen here if THEY are trying so hard to block it!”
Keep fighting. You’re a winner. It’s all going to turn out ok.
I’m looking forward to our little Tip Hill Fiber Fest Saturday! See you then!
April 19th, 2005 at 7:31 am
Aside from my serious empathy with the messed up knitting and the work of righting knitting mistakes…. your ‘getting tired of living where I’m not’ struck a serious chord. Hang in there.