Sunday, November 25, 2007

why i am okay not going to the party

Time, as I have always thought of it, has cracked open and broken like a shell off a boiled egg. I have seen that even when I am doing nothing a lot is still happening in my life and in my story. And when I am striving and manipulating and worrying myself sick, maybe I am no more than a cat playing with a ball of yarn. Control is mostly illusion. Probably it is bad for the skin.

So, while I am neither stoic (alas, Henry, what will be will be) nor nihilist (whaaa! my life doesn't even matter so why should I even try) I do not feel at the mercy of times and seasons. In fact, I find tremendous meaning in most of life, and count my contribution as valuable - no matter what the people say. But I no longer think of myself as the one responsible to keep the universe (even my universe) going. (And this, for a mother of four, is quite a step of growth!)

Thirty five years ago a chain of events began that quickly spun beyond my control, a chain of events that still careens against and with the forces of life and nature, now involving dozens of people and a constellation of chaos, possibility and joy. I couldn't have orchestrated the beauty of all these things.

When I grab onto and manage my own and other's time, things tend toward simplistic solutions and results, which is the best my mind can design. Less molested, life seems to unfold in a complex strata of dynamic collisions and cohesions.

All that being said, I still wish I could come to the party.

2 comments:

111 said...

lovely. :) and your presence will be at the party ... in the person of 3 very charming & lovely to behold human beings.

Sarah said...

ooo...evolving posts...always fun. I like this. Ive pondered my delusions of control (more pathological than illusions), but like the acknowledgement that things are always more interesting when orchestrated by infinitely bigger hands....