I need to spend some time remembering why I’m here, why I put myself out here, why I do all the various things I do. Because I like doing them? Or because they’ve simply become habit?
I could write a book just about the things I no longer do, the things I no longer have time for, or make time for, or find time for. I could write a book…if I bothered, but let’s be honest: online journaling is about as far as my writing is and will ever take me. That’s fine, I’m down with that.
This past week there have been no evening obligations. I’ve left work on time, at 4 pm and the sun is still high in the sky until around 9, right now, when it blends down and melts into the horizon line, buttering everything golden in the process. Instead of speeding by, each evening has stretched out and filled up with something I’m not all that used to having nowadays: time.
Time to simply sit and read, both things I can hold in my hands, and things I can scroll past on my screen. Time to simply sit and talk to my kids: about what they think of their friends, their days, their likes & dislikes, the start of school. Time to putter about the house and straighten a painting, adjust the placement of a vase, rearrange a shelf of books. Time to flip through recipes and think about making dishes I haven’t tried yet.
Time. Mostly it’s elusive, grabbed at and strained through the colander of overwhelming obligations: work, school, kid activities, club stuff, meetings, appointments. But just this week, and maybe only this week, while the clock races toward the frenzy of autumn, it’s been a gift and a sliding, gliding journey through stillness.
Tomorrow revs up again: Anders comes home! And the house needs a thorough cleaning and party prep for Saturday’s crayfish fest whirls into gear. There’s maybe another hour before I need to place my head on the pillow and get some shut-eye, and I intend to spend it well: simply spending it well, doing much of nothing.