not-wanting

If your path is difficult but you love what you do, if it has you hanging on by your fingernails one day, and floating on a cloud the next, sometimes it just makes sense to love the dog that bites you. I recently used that line as a comment on Averil Dean’s blog. It got me to thinking.

As a writer who has achieved a modicum of success I’ve been bitten by rejection so many times that any weaker person, one less apt to deal with a reddened turned-the-other-cheek, would have caged that animal or put it to rest. But I love being a writer; I cannot imagine doing anything else. It feeds my mind and inebriates my soul. It also fuels ‘the dream’.

I used to think everybody dreams, everybody wants more, everybody longs for some sort of legacy; I was wrong. I get that generalizations are foolish, and assumptions suck, but I genuinely pity, and in a way I envy, those who are content with their station in life. Not-wanting...yes a part of me is jealous of the calmness, because if you are not-wanting then you are not open to the angst of not-getting.

But there is duplicity to calmness; it means you are either at peace, never even thought or dared to want something besides a pedestrian life or you have given up.

So which is it, are you calm or are you on alert for the next bite?

I am a lucky one

Wikipedia defines miracle as an event attributed to divine intervention. Others explain it as the unexplainable, that it surpasses all known human or natural powers and is inexplicable by the laws of nature...yup…that’s what happened to me this morning…again.

To me miracles can be those really big ones like someone in a wheelchair, walking, a comatose patient, conscious and talking - the against all odds ones, the blow your mind kind, the plane crash survivor ones, the walk away without a scratch from a train wreck ones, well, that’s not what this is about. This is about an ‘oh-wow-WTF-can-you-believe-this’, brought way down to everyday level. It was just amazing enough for me to believe something else is at work here, like a greater power, an ultimate game of life player and I’m one of those little cars under the  player’s index finger being pushed around the board. My miracle involved money. Not a lot, just enough.

When you are hungry, enough is a feast, when you have to look up to see the zero in your checkbook, enough is a miracle. Now, more than ever, I believe God is an accountant.

When was your last miracle?

Truman winked

Thinking about the force and fallout relating to the columns I am compiling for my book pretty much takes up most of my thoughts, other than when I’m trying to come up with something different for dinner or trying to remember which bill has to paid and when. Remembering what inspired each column is like separating the wheat from the chaff  because sometimes it’s more than one thought process but a series of a mind full of events. When the diluted liquid boils away, when the fat is skimmed off the surface, I’m left with the guts of inspiration and results. And as everyone knows, sometimes the guts of the soup are tastier than the broth.

One of the columns, Singing in the Lane, is about what we say, act and do when we are alone in the car. Singing in the car is pretty universal, we’ve all done it, and even though we’re all Grammy winners in the shower, singing in the car and sounding stupid as backup or lead is pure fun. But the column was not only about singing in the car it was also about talking. Admitting that I talk to myself in the car and am actually interviewed (as practice) was pretty easy and explainable, or so I thought because not sounding like a loon was becoming difficult.

So I’m driving home from work on Tuesday evening and I’m thinking about my dilemma when the movie Truman Show comes to mind...the scene when Truman, Jim Carrey and his best friend, Marlon, played by Noah Emmerich are sitting on a bridge talking about the truth, which is actually a lie, of their lifelong friendship.

For those who are not familiar with the movie it is about a reality show following the life of Truman, a man who has no idea that since birth, he has been surrounded by actors and that he is watched by the entire world 24/7/365. When he begins to suspect that something is amiss, his best friend Marlon, a paid actor, is sent to reassure him that all is fine and that what he is experiencing is the same angst all people experience from time to time. The two friends are sitting on the edge of a bridge, it’s late, they are sharing a six-pack and I remembered Marlon saying something about,  I am paraphrasing, who doesn’t sit on the can and pretend to be interviewed by Sea Haven News. When I watched that scene the first time, the revelation that other people did what I occasionally do, I’m sitting in the car not on the can, was enlightening. So I wasn’t a loon. I wanted to use that scene in my book.

As I arrived home I thought I’d have to rent the movie, borrow or buy it, or somehow find it online just to view the thirty second section of the film to see if my paraphrasing was correct. That’s when I went from thinking about Truman to the macaroni and cheese, ham and pea casserole I had to prepare for dinner.

Fast forward, today Wednesday I had the day off. The luxury of having the house to myself had me writing almost all day, and because the house was quiet, I decided to do one of my most favorite things in the afternoon, take a nap. As I lay down, the house was to silent so I turned on the TV, to lull me to sleep. Instantly in all its cinematic wonder, Truman Show came on two minutes before the bridge scene. I am still marveling at how my thoughts, eighteen hours before set in motion the implausibility of this coincidence. It’s called a ‘God wink’ when things like that happen, a little thump on the head to get your attention. Not knowing what attention I was supposed to bring to the moment, I watched the rest of the movie then went back to the computer and wrote...this. 

I never did get a nap in, so what do you do in the car while you’re alone? Keep it clean please, God winked today.