August 21, 2024
I have resigned myself to the
reality that the weather will do what the weather will do. As with other
things, when it comes to the weather, I try to adopt a flexible stance. At any
moment on any given day, I can activate the two fans in my office: one an
overhead, and one a tired yet still (basically) functional tower fan with
oscillating capabilities. Conversely, I have a decorative fireplace with a very
real, and fairly efficient electric heater unit which is easily activated.
The result is that I can adjust
my environment to cooler, or warmer, depending.
I also have a “mini fridge” in
my office, which is stocked with a selection of cold drinks: water, juice, diet
soda, or canned sweet tea of various flavors. I also have, thanks to one of my
grandsons and his wife, a mini electric hot plate which is a coffee cup warmer,
and just on the other side of the door that separates my office from the
kitchen stands my Keurig, always at the ready.
The result is that I can enjoy
a cold drink or keep a hot drink warm, depending.
I used to live my life in
blocks of time that were fairly rigidly regulated. I would get up to an alarm
that went off at five in the morning, even after I no longer worked outside the
home myself. This, because for several years after I “retired”, I would get up
at that time so I could drive my husband to work. Then, of course, I would come
home and go back to bed. I had until about four-fifteen each day to do as I
chose but at four-sixteen I needed to be in my car, on my way to pick David up
from work.
The result was that in that
interim, I could write, or do housework, or read, depending.
Upon our return from David’s
place of employment each weekday, I would go into supper making mode. Then came
eating, the news, and whatever entertainment the TV would offer us until it was
time to head to bed—usually by no later than eleven—to begin the routine all
over again the next day.
Weekends tended to be the only
days that were not always scripted, the only days that were potentially free
time. Get up early or sleep in, go out, stay home. And yet we also had to use
our weekends to fit in all our responsibilities that could not be accomplished Monday
to Friday.
The result was that the
weekends were when we’d shop, do laundry, or yard work, depending.
Flexibility, I decided long
ago, was the key to making life work. One couldn’t be too rigid in one’s coping
mechanisms. Going with the flow, for the most part, is a sound operating
procedure. But it does have its limitations.
For most of us, there is,
somewhere, and likely in more than one category, a bottom line below which we
will not sink. There needs to be a few points of stability, or perhaps we can
call them guard-rails or anchors. Usually these form within our psyches organically
as we walk our individual paths in life, as we grow and mature. I would submit
that as one ages, one’s guard-rails, one’s anchors, become more deeply fixed.
Like concrete they harden over time.
When we’re young, there are
many hills on which we are willing to die—and usually in truly keenly emoted
and overly dramatic fashion. But as we age, that number goes down, until we
realize a basic truth of personal maturity.
There truly are damn few
things worth going to the mat for. But for those things that are, they are
points of principle that are so deeply entwined with who and what we are as
human beings, they’re priceless.
As I have been watching and
noting the world around me this week, I have discovered that not only am I not
alone in my belief of this precept; I may in fact be standing in what could
prove to be a tsunami of fellowship.
Love,
Morgan
https://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury
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