Time

"the secret of life is enjoying the passage of time" ~ James Taylor

the concept of time is a mystery. no matter how hard i try i can't wrap my head around it. how it happens, why, when - you name it, i'm trying to figure it out. time goes by slowly in the moment but quickly when the moment's over. a day spent languishing is never long enough. it seems like i have hours to go, then all of a sudden it's over. i don't get that never-ending day feeling unless i'm working, then it's "will this day ever end?"

"we may never pass this way again" ~ Seals & Crofts

i often think about stopping time. if i had that ability, in which moments would i choose to linger? at a concert recently, Tommy Shaw, the feeling and artistry of the singer and the songs, left me wanting to feel it for hours longer. that empty feeling when the moment has passed and you're left waiting for more. i started to think, where would i stop time if i could, what moments would i preserve. the trouble with that thinking is that times often seem commonplace when you're in them. they don't seem as special until life has changed and gone past the simpler times. i know now which ones i would've liked to savour but didn't know at the time.

"old days, good times i remember" ~ Chicago

when our schedules get crowded it seems there's never enough time. again, the concept eludes me. yes, i know, the cycle of life - birth, life, death - but what does that mean. you live a big part of life without the loved ones you treasured. you know that if you could stop time, you would choose moments wisely and those with lost loved ones are first on the list. but would you know to stop it? when they are old or sick it's logical to think that way. but time spent with those same folks when they're young and healthy or those who are taken too early, time spent with them may be one of those commonplace feelings that don't merit a second thought, that don't make the list of where to stop.

"if i could turn back time" ~ Cher

so i'm left with the same dilemma - where would i pull the plug on moving on quickly to the next moment. which moments deserve that privilege. savour times past or preserve the present because i'm painfully aware of where it all ends. back to the concert. somehow i know that it made the list. that the feeling i had during those moments was one i needed to last longer. back to the concept of time and the mystery it holds.

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writing while mad

i tell people that after i'm gone, someone is going to get an earful (or an eyeful actually). i have SO many journals and anything with pages that i've turned into journals that, like i said, someone will find out a lot more about me than they intended. unless i somehow dispose of them before then which is about as likely as the proverbial flying pigs. one of the downsides of journaling your feelings is that your feelings actually do get journaled. and when i'm most likely to need an outlet is when i'm spilling over with thought. sometimes it's happy happy joy joy, others a cathartic release about something playing in my head. and then there are times when i'm downright mad. yep. when i feel like hurling those feelings at their target, sometimes (not always by any means) writing them out seems like the option that just may keep the peace. so i spill. what they did, how it made me feel, how they could've acted differently, on, on, on. oh that felt good. i can now walk back into the arena without my gloves on. and the page gets lost among all the others. until there it is, at some future date. for whatever reason it's there and i'm reading. it could be over someone long gone from my life but i'm right back in that moment, totally pissed off. and you know what? he or she really was an asshole, most likely a BIG reason why they no longer inhabit my space. i've never been one of those with a "gratitude" journal or putting any name to a space that i feel should be unbridled. except i do write down my dreams on a separate space for whatever reason. maybe it's because they are so utterly bizarre that i want them to have a place where they can exist separate from reality. but the mad gets mixed in with all the other reality, on whatever page in whatever book is handy.should probably create a journal for madness only and once released those pages need to leave at some point. either when the object of the fury is no longer around so there isn't any way those feelings can spring back to life through random page-turning. or better yet when the anger has subsided and i'm back spending good times with whoever-it-is. it's a good idea and one i should definitely implement, unfortunately it sits with al the other ideas with good intention but not enough action. how about a "good idea" journal? sounds like, well, a good idea.

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Mind Games

Funny how little some people know about me. lately I’ve been pulling these old stories out of my head in conversation and surprising myself thinking that people who’ve known me for years don’t know 

Reynolds & Reynolds. For the rich bitch Gold opened at 400% over market today. 1979 Dave Greenwood. So funny, I was the rich bitch?

Weekend in vegas. Ed likes the smokey, dusty dimly-lit rooms full of gambling people. He likes to drink and gamble. Funny, I remember having gone through a few phases like that – in my 20s, stay at the blackjack table until 2am. Tidal winnings – up / down / up / down – hopefully leaving with more. But not much so it may not have been worth the price of the experience.

It used to be such a grownup thing to do. Walk up to a blackjack table and plunk down your $20. Tommy used to say that the dealers just LOOOOOVED those "girls with their 20’s”.  He said that was their bread and butter. It seems you have to have money to make money. Or win money. And I never went in with anything. I just couldn’t imagine saving money to gamble. Or give it away. I’d rather have something to show for it. Through my husband though, I’ve come to understand that someone who considers that atmosphere akin to entertainment. Like a dinner and a concert. I’ve never balked at that before so maybe I can see how it could be viewed as something to save for.

Desert, tumbleweeds. Always feels the same driving through. I always wonder how it feels to live here. Or there. Especially in a foreign country, I don’t know why I find it so hard to wrap my head around it. These people think this is perfectly normal. Like the woman in the water taxi. Surrounded by the glory of Bora Bora, I asked her if she knew just how beautiful it all is. How does it feel to live with such beauty? She looked at me sorta strange and half-shrugged her shoulders. It’s just home to me.

Some moments stick in your mind for no apparent reason. You forget so many things. Moreso as you age. Even what you had for breakfast. Yet the moments are still there. The same ones. And they pop up at the strangest times. It doesn’t have to be anything necessarily monumental or even all that special. But for some reason durable.

Reynolds & Reynolds.

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More stream...

disclaimer (since i always seem to have one these days): new day, new blog. trying for stream of conciousness, dump on screen if you will. not likely to be very uplifting, i'm in one of "those" moods today. mood disorders are a bitch. they can be exhasperating to say the least. to those who have to put up with me on a daily basis, i salute you.

it's amazing how different each day can feel. to me, the weather just feels swampy. a friend on facebook posted that it reminds her of being in the bahamas and she loves it. if i got to choose, which some say i do but it's hard to believe sometimes, i would pick the tropical memory over the cursed sticky air. all in how you see it.

take my job for instance. i am gainfully employed and VERY grateful to be so. that said, the difference between how i feel there from one day to the next is staggering. since i'm not doing any good for the world or those in it, it almost always feels pointless. i often feel underappreciated or completely overlooked. then a day comes along where i feel accomplished and proud, but more often then not there's just too much to do to ever finish anything, too many e-mails to answer, too many steps to solve a problem and too many people who need something from me.

then, there are the interviews. an open position in a desirable company is scarce these days. still, i'd like to hire the best possible person so that means weeding through candidates who just want to get their "foot in the door" at "the studios". ugh. when i hear that my mind almost always goes: NEXT. "i can do anything someone throws at me", "i'm a team player", "i have excellent customer service skills"....on and on, platitudes, cliches, one to the next. i've learned long ago that to glean a person's true ability and demeanor from a 1/2 hour conversation is next to impossible. and yet both of those qualities are critical to how i feel about my job from day to day.

as usual, as i'm writing this i'm seeing the obvious lesson that i've missed. since that's often what journaling is supposed to do, and what is blogging but public journaling, i feel proud that i push myself to do this since so many people don't. this particular lesson says clearly that i can't control the factors that are outside of my control, that come from circumstance or from others' contribution to my world. it feels so much to me like i have some control, but for the most part i don't have much. i've heard this, over and over, that i can only change or should worry about what i can control and let the rest take care of itself. that others' actions aren't under my control, but my REactions are.

to apply this lesson is my challenge for today. if it were my only challenge, i'd be a very lucky gal.

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