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Imagine a Blue Sky, Blissful Weekend

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Oh my wow! It’s Friday, again! Already!

What did I do this week? What didn’t I get done? What miracles did I make? What wishes didn’t come? What went right? What went wrong? Who were those cranky people I had to calm down? Who were the ones who gave me such support?

Will I spend my weekend reliving my week over and over?

Is that what time is for. Is that what life is about?

No, no. Not my life.

When I’m in that last five minutes of my life and when I’m in the five minutes that come after, I want to be thinking of the time I spent being alive.

I want my life to be about living.

I can imagine a wonderful weekend. I can hang the moon in the daylight sky. I can fill the night with colorful lights and people who have great ideas. I can imagine being with friends who understand that living isn’t always easy, but it’s always about thinking and caring, and remembering to breathe.

I can imagine a blue sky, blissful weekend.

Then I can make it happen.

Storytell Your Life So You Never Forget What You're About

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I've been thinking . . .

about stories.

I’m remembering a song from my childhood.

“Tell me a story. Tell me a story.
You promised me. You said you would.
You gotta give in, ’cause I’ve been good.
Tell me a story, and then I’ll go to bed.”

The best were the stories my dad told about his life. I’ll never forget those. . . .

My friends used to say that no matter how bad things got, the experience was worth it, if we ended up with a story to tell. That thinking helped us turn the most unpleasant happenings into adventures and quests.

We would sit and swap stories while sipping wine, listening to music, and letting candles burn to set the mood. That wasn’t the only time we told stories though.

Stories were the way that we told each other where we had been and who we were.

As we got to know each other, it seems that we could hardly get near one another without telling a tale of an event in our lives. In the car, on the phone, we were constantly sharing a piece of an epic — all detailed and filled with conversation and setting — as if we were relating a scene from “on the road” movie we had seen at the local theater.

Stories of our lives were how we figured out what was going on.

We don’t do that as much now.

Now the information seems to come fast. The stories are shorter — less detailed, more factual. We relate data. The stories we try to tell aren’t as delicious as they once were. We don’t savor them anymore.

I vote that we slow down and start storytelling our lives again. I promise that if you tell a story rich with the wonder of living, I’ll be here alive with anticipation, ready to listen. Our stories are worth every second we take to pass them on.

The real ones are the best, even the real ones that only happened in our heads.

Let’s storytell our lives so we never forget who we are and what we are about.

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Personal Identity: Forgiveness

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Can we talk about . . .

forgiveness.

I’ll take a risk and say something revealing.
All of my life, I’ve been, next to my dad, the most forgiving person.
And then I think my father had a little extra forgiveness tucked away for me.

That’s not to say. I can’t be nasty, or blind, or even selfish. I suffer from every distinctly human trait. Some more than most.

I just can’t keep an angry state. I have this overwhelming sense of hope. I can’t help but see another side besides my own.

melting heart

I don’t know that all of this giving and forgiving is a good thing. I know it’s come back to bite me. I’ve the marks to prove that’s so.

Can one person be too forgiving? My head tells me that it could be a fact.

My heart tells me “no.”
I like my heart’s answer best.

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A Whole New Day

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What Are You Waiting for?

It’s a whole new day.
Look at the sky.
We’ve never seen that exact sky before, nope, not that one. It’s brand new today.
What will you do to celebrate it?

What whole new thought will you bring to the whole new you that woke up this whole new morning? Will you take a whole new minute to savor an idea?

Will you have a whole new cup of coffee or your favorite tea, while you while away some time just looking out the window on a whole new day that’s just beginning?

Might you plan a whole new way of doing something? Take a whole new walk around a whole new block outside your building. Say a “hello” to a whole new someone you might like to meet.

Will you take a chance at finding a whole new side to someone who you’ve known for what seems like forever? Could you start a whole new habit of smiling for no good reason?

You have a whole new day to think of something.

It’s your life and the coolest part is tomorrow will be a whole new day all over again.

blue-blue-sky-sunrise

Holy cow! Can you believe a blue, blue sky like that? It’s a whole new way of seeing.

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I'm the Life of the Party . . .

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Can we talk about . . .

parties.

Don’t feel bad if I don’t come to your party. It’s not that I don’t want to be with you to celebrate. It’s that parties scare me.

People at parties act differently. They talk differently. They smile party smiles. They chat party chatter. I watch people at parties, and I see them waiting for the fun to begin. It’s intimidating. I end up like Alice in Wonderland at the Tea Party. My words seem to be in another language.

If I get there early, I’m sure the fun hasn’t happened. If I come in the middle, the fun seems to have started without me. I’m not sure how to join in. If I get there too late, the fun seems to be over.

People say, “Hey, here comes the life of the party.” I think, Uh-oh my life is now over. I’m about to do something too big or too foolish.

To me parties are more like the Serengeti than like my natural habitat. Navigating a party is much harder than a photo safari.

It works better, if I don’t call it a party. If I call it a few friends “getting together,” the pressure seems to come off. I can talk to friends without feeling that “fun responsibility.” Friends don’t expect friends to be effervescent and fun every minute, . . . except maybe at a party.

Fun is so elusive and undefinable. I don’t want to be in charge of it. Sometimes I don’t know I’ve had it until I look back long after it’s over.

I know I had fun once, but don’t ask which time it was.

Oh yeah, then that one special party happens . . . when I lose self-consciousness. Fun falls from the sky like stardust on me . . . yeah then, going back to the real world no fun at all.

I guess I pack too much into when the word parties. I wonder whether I’ll ever outgrow that.

Until then, I’ll keep thinking of them as visitng my friends who are getting together for some occasion. Then, I can have a good time and even be entertaining.

Sometimes I can be the life of the party, as long as it’s not a party.

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Personal Identity: It's Just a Little Lie

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Can we talk about . . .

a little lie.

This weekend I had a conversation with someone who told a little lie. He talked about what I do as if he followed my work each day. He was pretending, guessing. It’s sad to report. His guess was miles away.

“If you’re going to lie to me, please have the decency to be convincing.” Hugh Prather, Jr. said.

I suppose this young man, in his own way, was paying me a compliment. Maybe he wanted me to know he thought I was important. But what he did was say he wasn’t confident that I would be okay if he admitted he never read my work. His problem? Yes. But then he handed it to me.

It’s just a little lie, but what do I do with it?

I’m caught between the truth and embarrassment. In my younger days, I would have gone straight for the truth as gently as I could, thinking that I would save the misperception from continuing. These days I do that less.

I didn’t tell the guy he had it wrong. I figured I can’t fix all of the misperceptions in the world. I figured sooner or later folks who’d hear from him might consider the source.

Have I gotten old and lazy or realistic? Have I quit taking myself so seriously or sold out?

After all, it’s just a little lie.

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