Riding the high winds of my 24th birthday, I
had a very successful week. I closed several files at work and cleared out my voicemails
and emails. At home, I started pruning the garden, helped reorganize the house
for the new tenants, and stocked up on groceries. Sunday, I played in my first
softball game of the season, getting some exercise out in right field. One
morning, as I was putting away my food, Jon came down to the kitchen and told
me he had a very productive morning too. In an animated voice, he told me how he
had chased the ducks away from the pool using his drone! It’s more effective
when you can follow them through the air. I suppose the definition of my week’s
productivity was a little more conventional.
In the second week, the winds died down and I spiralled into the mud. How easily the winds can change! And once you have that wetness
in your shoes, how easy is it to sink in negativity? To keep you out of the
air? One negative thought breeds another until you’re knee-deep in the swamp
with a dozen croaking toads blinking unevenly at you. Oft times, all there is
to do is trudge forward, reach dry ground and let the mud cake off. Logic
reasons, “There will be a better day!”
By Friday, I had almost recovered. The results came back
for my eighth and ninth insurance exams, and the passing marks were a bit of
a boost. But, a passage in particular – the beginning actually – of Emerson’s
essay on Spiritual Laws provided a positive countermeasure to my disquiet. It
reads:
“When the act of
reflection takes place in the mind, when we look at ourselves in the light of
thought, we discover that our life is embosomed in beauty. Behind us, as we go,
all things assume pleasing forms, as clouds do far off. Not only things familiar
and stale, but even the tragic and terrible are comely as they take their place
in the pictures of memory.”
And for the most part – in my privileged life – I agree
with just that. Life as it is, as a whole, in its raw form has its own beauty
to the observer. And as humans are thinkers, we can observe our own thoughts
and experiences in a partially objective light; to see that there is elegance
in both love and loss. So, instead of snubbing the clouds and demanding sun, I
remind myself to appreciate the moment and let reason prevail.
There will be a better day.
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