GRIZZLY PEAR
Sometimes I just stepped back last night and looked around.
Dang I’m lucky.
Maybe I helped make some of the luck. But it’s not as if I performed any monumental efforts or made any sacrifices to get here. I just showed up regularly and did what I thought I was supposed to do.
Aside from counting my blessings, what am I going to do with this luck?
Sure are disruptive.
I believe they are supposed to be fun.
But getting ready for one sure feels like work.
Maybe we should rethink next year’s run.
Then again, a break will be good.
With the boy being mobile and pulling at everything within reach, we decided to get rid of the curtain for the glass panel in the door to the backyard, replacing it with a vinyl panel.
The panel was 21″ wide by 80″ tall. Per the manufacturer’s instructions, we oversized the initial cut by an inch so we could trim the film after was installed.
To get the best measurement, we started from the one inch mark and cut it at the twenty two inch mark.
Oops. At least it turned out we cut it at the perfectly correct width.
It seems that a midlife crisis is an common occurrence in our culture, especially with the prospect of turning forty this year.
I wonder this new gig with its attendant change in status and pay will stave off the inevitable.
But once I get comfortable in the gig, will it come?
I guess I’ll find out.
Maybe I just need to stay being uncomfortable?
Maybe I’m already in the middle of it!
I was outside an old industrial park and I noticed a chalk line on the slab outside one of the storefront doors.
It was about an inch back from face of the finish so I suspect it was the line of the studs when they did a refresh of the place. That would make this chalk line maybe two decades old?
I’m certain it survived over the years because this tenant had two doors, and this door was typically locked and unused. But still, that’s a long time for a chalk line to hang around!
Sometimes our most insignificant marks last much longer than we could imagine.
A few weeks ago, we went out to Willow Beach to look at the wildflowers. It’s about an hour away from our place, and I was sitting in the back row of the Odyssey.
I couldn’t sleep, so I started surfing the phone.
I didn’t get the headache I normally get from reading in a moving car (I don’t have that problem in airplanes or busses).
One the one hand that’s kind of cool, but I’m not sure having yet another place I can be in touch with the internet is a good thing.
Like everyone else I’m trying to cut back.
Yesterday, we went to the annual World Tai Chi day festivities at the Delmar Gardens.
This time, some of the familiar faces weren’t there.
But then again, some of them were. And I got to introduce my daughter to my new teachers (at least when I can make it to class).
As the calendar continues its march through the year, many more such moments are due for the school.
Such is the fate of life I guess….
On another note, I ran into a coffee acquaintance and he mentioned that one of his former coworkers had started with another shop, just earlier that week. It really is a small valley, everybody is somehow connected in multiple ways.
I’ve been watching and rewatching some tai chi videos from my school to relearn the 48 form they teach. It would have been a whole lot easier (and better!) if I just kept practicing and I don’t have to relearn it every couple years. That said, it has been good to go over some things which I never really got figured out correctly in the first place.
Also my wife and I just watched Paprika. We watched it a decade ago in the theater. I still have no idea what just happened, but dang it’s a glorious spectacle.
The little marsh pheasant
Must hop ten times
To get a bite of grain.She must run a hundred steps
Before she takes a sip of water.
Yet she does not ask
To be kept in a hen run.Though she might have all she desired
Set before her.She would rather run
The Way of Chuang Tzu, translated by Thomas Merton, pages 48 & 49
And seek her own little living
Uncaged.
A good challenge to those of us in comfortable jobs. Being part of an organization may be a great opportunity to do things one couldn’t do on their own.
But it could also be a trap, especially for someone like me, who has fairly conservative tendencies.
I woke up this morning with multiple things on my list. Everything needed to be addressed. Now.
I had barely enough discipline to perfunctorily exercise for a few minutes and a deep breath and look at my things to do list.
And then I started to jump in.
But then I felt thirsty and went to the kitchen to heat up some water.
And then I realized I forgot something.
Why hello world!