A New Drummer

Minutes away from March.  I know that spring will not be officially here for several more days, but seasons are no respecters of calendars.  It is here.  The thermometer topped 80 degrees today, and I've noticed more than one tree budding early.

 

We had such a short winter, with only two recognizable cold snaps.  Such a thing is always memorable in this part of Texas, but these were so far removed from one another as to make them seem a thing created in the mind rather than the environment.

 

March has always been my personal New Year.  January and February are spent getting used to writing an incremented year on checks and documents, and it seems like only a few short days ago you celebrated Christmas with family.  Once March arrives, there is no longer uncertainty.  Things have moved on.  In school, this was the busy time.  It seemed that every project and paper and exam were pushing toward this time when the end of the year grew so close; just within reach.  Busy with extracurriculars and enjoying the outdoors again, riding my mountain bike down dusty roads.

 

And I recognize the acceleration of life.  The year is no longer divided up in neat little compartments: fall and spring semesters, Christmas and summer vacation, Spring Break, syllabi, midterms and finals.  Work is in the same place with the same people, at least a lot of the time.  The projects change, but the location of your desk rarely does.

 

I don't decry this; such is life.  But this thought and March have something in common; this is a rendezvous point for such thoughts.  It is a reminder to slow down, smell the proverbial roses, remember to not act as if this thought hasn't occurred to every generation since the dawn of time.  Those moments where we slow down are special, and are one of the few things one can truly savor in one's soul.  March is a time when a droplet of water on a leaf reminds you of the infinite, of the cycles and rhythm of change catalogued by the Teacher in Ecclesiastes 3.  Did you know that March was the first month on the Roman calendar?  I think there's something to that.

 

Jesus tells us in Matthew 6:34, "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own."  And so I begin my year with these words fixed firmly in mind.  (Let's not take bets to see how long they remain.)  Die Freude am Frühling!  I welcome it with enthusiasm, despite my lament on the passage of winter.

Here at Home

It is raining and rather dreary out today. I love weather like this. I love camping in weather like this. It makes the ritual of fire so much more practical.

I'm recovering from a prolonged internet blackout at home. When I returned home last night, eager to check on a surprising news story, I found my network connection frustratingly slow and unresponsive. I spent Saturday morning troubleshooting and waiting for a tech from my ISP. Eventually he arrived and started getting to business. It took a little over an hour for him to replace some hardware and make some necessary adjustments. Despite my queries, he was less than forthright about the problem. In fact, he told me nothing about it at all. I signed for the work and he went away.

A few tweaks here and a refresh there, and things are better than ever. I can breathe again. Ah, sweet ones and zeroes.

More on that surprising news story. They discovered ricin in a dorm room at UT. In my old dorm. So, I find that interesting. Even more so, I discover that this old dorm of mine is now coed. During my years there, it was men only. Of course, it was practically coed then anyway. Still, very interesting and close to home in a way.

Paging Dr. Jung

Assuming that eyes still at times fall on this blog...

 

I want you to think about something.  This will require a certain degree of introspection and personal candor, but I want you to deeply contemplate what I'm asking nonetheless.  This is an issue that comes up again and again among certain people, and those people and their witnesses point it out and laugh.  It is an anxious laugh, one that is self-conscious and eager to both get past the issue and pretend that it never really existed.

 

How many people are inside you?  No, really, this is the question.  Do you find that you and your life are dominated by a singular inner personality, and are therefore led by one voice?  Or, do you find that there are competing desires, perceptions, resolutions, courses of action, and (dare I use the word) voices, all of which require you to discern the best decision possible in that moment?

 

I know you're thinking, "Okay, enough of the Cybil talk."  But, I really am curious about the distribution of these two modes of being.  I confess that I am the latter, and that, at any given time, there are several threads of thought processed through individual worldviews.  As such, I appreciate, and even envy, those whose decisions are instantaneous and mark a paucity of hyperanalytical predilection.

 

Inside there are the historian and SysAdmin, Raskolnikov and Val Jean, Paul and Thomas, the romantic and the cynic, the extravert and the reserved, compassionate and apathetic, bold and fearful, and other voices that defy definition.

 

Perhaps you consider these merely facets of one whole.  It helps me to personify them; to allow each an opportunity to explain their presence and declare their desires.  It could be one will say something I've never heard before.  It could be I should only listen to the loudest one.

Edibles

I've had a rather uninteresting weekend.  I should have spent some of the downtime writing.  Instead, I spent it watching cooking shows on PBS.  I really love those cooking shows.

 

There are so many topics going through my head lately, and few of them are uplifting.  I would like to get out from under this raincloud and feel the warmth of sunlight again.  Perhaps soon.

 

It's snowing on the east coast.  There will be many people who have to shovel their driveways and many of younger years engaged in the serious art of making snow forts.  I don't come from a snowy climate, but always dreamed about it.  I love snow; I love what snow represents.  I like the cold.

Sloop John B

Near where I grew up is an old fort built upon a hill called Phantom.  The only recognizable structures remaining are a munitions dump, a guardhouse, and several chimneys jutting out of crumbling foundations.  Largely because of the name, this place held a fascination for me in my youth, and I would always be excited when opportunity came to visit it or even drive past it on the highway.  Even today, the highway passing by winds through vast open spaces populated only by the occasional ranch house and small clumps of mesquite trees.  It is lonely, windy and dry.  There is today a lake, of sorts, nearby, but water was disturbingly scarce when this fort was occupied in the late 1850s.  One soldier stationed at the fort wrote in a journal about the long periods of hot days and no water.  Indeed, the outpost was ultimately abandoned in part because water was such an infrequent resource.

 

And when I arrived 130 years later, there was little different about the climate.  I have an indescribable affinity for water.  Perhaps I was awkwardly born away from the sea, and there is something eternal within my soul that yearns to be near it again.  Perhaps absence doth make the heart grow fonder, and I owe this affection of combined hydrogen and oxygen to the human desire to define the mysterious or unknown.  I like anything to do with the water: swimming, diving, boating, tubing.  During college, I was introduced to another activity completely outside the scope of my experience.

 

On a crisp, clear and breezy spring Saturday, we went to the lake.  I remember almost everything about this day, the day I was introduced to sailing.  There is fun, history, survival, culture, expertise and hierarchy all wrapped up in this one thing.  Three of us prepared to take out a 25 foot keelboat, a relatively simple sailing system.  I am accustomed to watching the pilot of the boat seated at the helm, where in front he has ignition switches and a wheel and behind there is a powerful engine for propulsion.  All the controls for the boat are concentrated in one location.  The operation of a sailboat is much more complicated by several orders of magnitude, and one of sufficient size is almost impossible for one person to pilot.  To see one on the open water under full sail, however, is an illustration of grace and teamwork and tranquility.  It is beautiful, a fact supported by the quantity of sailboat photographs and paintings adorning walls around the world.

 

Under sail, you've given up control.  You court the wind in order to spurn the water.  There are many elements you may influence, but if the wind does not cooperate, you gain nothing toward your destination.

 

I barely know my port from my starboard, but I want to learn.  If you've ever watched a sailboat race, you've seen crews working hard and synchronized.  I've seen that and it looks like fun; it looks like something I would want to do.  It's not too late to move to the coast.

Spirit and Opportunity: Part One

Where were you the last time your world stopped making sense? For me, it's been the last eight months.

I remember sitting with a friend as the day dwindled toward evening on September 11, 2001. Two weeks into my last semester of college, we were sitting and watching the known world crumble in smoke, tragedy, and hate. I remember that our discussion turned to one fact: that our world had just drastically changed and it might not be for the better. Our economy has improved and there is a sense of restored security. But always in the recesses of my conscious mind there exists a hint that tomorrow is an unknown. It is a Biblical truth.

I'm not sure where the line was between knowing I had something to give the world and thinking the world had something to give me. I don't know where that line was, but I've crossed it. It had something to do with money, and respect, and doors unexpectedly closed, or any of a thousand other reasons one could offer. When did my self stop being less and simply ish?

I'm approaching more quickly than I care to admit a decade since I left home with so many dreams to realize. In that time, I've learned so much about myself. There is less and less I like. For one, I am fallible. I can make a mistake many times over, in varying degrees of severity without learning a thing. After long experience and arduous labor, I have fashioned a meticulous cloak of apathy, which, always at the ready, I may throw about my shoulders in a moment. For some reason, I had to teach myself to not care.

I struggle with this daily question. Must I prepare myself to lose what I desire and abandon hope, or shall I cling to hope and persevere through tribulation all the while enduring the pain of watching my horizon slip ever further away?

In the world of psychology, there is the ever present debate of nature vs. nurture; studies leaning one way, research countering. Yet, there is no question in my mind that there are those born to cheerful disposition and those born to melancholy disposition. And I don't know why...

Soon, I must sift my life like wheat. Perhaps I will discover the nuance of direction. Perhaps I will discover passion again.