I have let too many days go by and succumbed to far more excuses for not writing than I should have allowed myself to employ. The simple truth suffices. I have been using every spare moment to organize and chair a Sunday Market at Park Delta Bay. What spare seconds hover between those tasks have been consumed studying for the California notary exam. After all, I have passed two bar exams. If I flunk a 30-question notary test, I will be wildly and heavily embarrassed. So time has passed since last I wrote here, and it could be the nth of any month for all I know.
In addition to these duties (addressed in the evenings when I am not working), I have been editing a collection of excerpts from my original blog, the Saturday Musings. I know that some of you have been wondering if I truly intended to publish it. The answer is, yes ma’am, yes sir. Unfortunately, I had composed each entry directly to the internet blog site. Therefore, I had no word version. I downloaded them and they downloaded in reverse date order. I had to “flip” them, and then cull them down (multiply ten years times 52, and that’s how many there are).
My idea is to publish a collection of 52, roughly four per designated month, five in the longer months. The collection spans the golden years of that blog, from 2009 – 2012. After 2012, so many awful things occurred in my life that the blog got a bit maudlin. So I have focused on what I believe are the best entries. Beyond that, I would like to have some visual art with which to illustrate them. While I search for suitable illustrations, I need to find an editor. All of this takes time. But at this point, at least, I have a working manuscript.
As though all that were not enough, I have attempted to launch into a campaign of self-healing. From a practical standpoint, I gained 15 pounds in the last year — or maybe 20 — and that weight must be shed. It greatly impacts my ability to walk. But deeper than that, I have spent hour upon hour in personal reflection. After all, the desire to change propelled me into this blog in December of 2013. At the time, I wanted to change to save my marriage. That did not work. I should have known it wouldn’t, but nonetheless in the most honest moment, I admit that the desire to repair that relationship compelled me to tackle my shortcomings.
Failing that, I have spent the last seven years embracing change for its own sake. I wanted to be the best version of myself that I could be. I was told at the outset by someone I loved that, and I quote, “people don’t talk that way”. Well, I beg to differ. I’m a people, and I talked that way. My goal is now, as it was in 2013 – 2014, to be the best version of myself that I can be.
This requires me to examine everything I do and say. When I err, I approach the person with whom I engaged outside of my preferred behavior. Though Marshall Rosenberg did not embrace the word “apology”, I find it convenient as a term of explanation. In his terms, I identify behavior that did not meet my need or the other person’s need. In my specific case, I articulate that behavior and pledge to the person that I will choose different behavior in the future. It is easier to call that an apology. Sincerity drives mine.
I also look for joyfulness and for opportunities to dwell in joy. That pursuit challenges me. Therefore it takes substantially more energy than anything else. But the pay-off — oh, the pay-off! My journey to joy has many lovely rest-stops.
But the journey itself seems lonely at times. I find many folks prefer a simpler existence. My life cannot be called simple. The complexities confound me at times. But as my Nana cautioned, I keep putting my best foot forward. I hope and pray that when I stumble, my guardian angel will leap forward to cradle me and ease the impact as she has always done.
It’s the twenty-fifth day of the seventy-ninth month of My Year Without Complaining. Life continues.
