Sunday, February 16, 2020

Running out of free time...

I keep wanting to write; late at night, early in the morning, in the middle of the workday, I think longingly of capturing my thoughts. I am always distractible though so it's hard to get into what I really want to talk about.

A lot of times it comes down to a desire to communicate with my kids. They live in this digital world, isolated from the wild. I too was isolated, but I had some lingering bit of wilderness to explore.  To me the sound of the wind in the trees was a lullaby, the rain on my window a symphony and the river near my home a meditation. If you sit near a river and peer into the flowing water it seems that all of life's problems flow in and out of your mind. In place of those problems beauty and fierce destruction a revealing of the inevitability of change, a sign of power beyond our own kenning.

My father had a large garden, he would go out every year and turn the earth with a shovel. I remember the sound of the metal against the rocks, a shiff, shiff sound that told me of his progress. I could smell the fresh cut of the grass wafting in through my open window and feel the cool breeze on the warm summer day. I would go out to talk to my Dad and break apart the clumps of dark brown earth. There were earth worms and centipedes, snails and little brown worms. There were also red spiders that would crawl out quickly, those always gave me a bit of fright! The earth smelled so wonderful, the feel of it would touch something deep within my core. I would dig my fingers and toes in, just reveling in the sensation! The sun would warm my hair and back and I would lay down in the cool, fresh cut grass and run my arms back and forth like I was making a snow angel. The earth, the blue sky, and the wind were the restorative to bring me back to life after dealing with the harshness of being indoors at a desk all the time.

Now I find myself cut off from the earth, from the sky, from the wind. It is a passing friend I gaze upon as I look out the windows and I walk by as I go to and from work. It's different being an adult, I feel more restrained.

I feel lucky to have this condo with it's tiny backyard. There are common grounds and plants but I don't own them. The thing is, I wish I had a nice house near some wilderness and a stream but that would be costly and I have a handle on how much this place costs me. But maybe I should make a move, maybe a villa or some other place in a part of the country that is cheaper to live in, or another country altogether!

Well I've got a moment of time and all I can do is search the endless monotony of the internet. I'm thinking about my children, my life, how it all has just happened so quickly, so relentlessly. In spite of my illnesses, in spite of my worries or anything else. All of my time ate away like the langoliers following behind me.

All that I want to do with my life gets eaten away, a little moment at a time. Anyway, I'm running out of free time at this very moment... TTYL