Tuesday, September 27, 2005
Life doesn’t need to be perfect.
I don’t need to have everything.
And making choices doesn’t necessarily entail the loss of one thing in exchange for another.
There are periods in my life that are characterized more precisely by music than anything else. And right now the soundbite on repeat mode in my head (and on my laptop too) is
You’re beautiful, you’re beautiful
You’re beautiful, it’s true
I saw your face in a crowded place and
I don’t know what to do
You’re beautiful, you’re beautiful
And I can’t escape the truth
I will never be with you.I heard it played live sitting at Fish and Co with the whole Borders group, and again at Wala with Phil Cal Val and while playing silly finger games and drinking vodka sprite.
And countless times curled up in bed in the wee hours of the morning dreaming thinking feeling lost in my own private universe with my little green lime scented candle sending silhouettes dancing across the walls.
It reminds me of sitting alone on the swings in PGP at 3 in the morning.
Or sitting by the pool watching ripples fan out from the tips of my toes.
My quarrel with life has always been that I want to do too much, too soon, and all at the same time. And the fear of not getting my everything was overwhelming and constant. I have thrown myself headfirst into life, afraid that there would be something life had to offer that I was missing, that I wasn’t filling up my time with enough stuff.
And for everything I did I would wonder if I could possibly have done something else.
Every moment of happiness always left me fighting to prolong it, to hold on to the unholdable and to store it, if possible, as a talisman against future sorrow.
But not everything is meant to be stored, just as life, and most of the things that make it, are not meant to last. There is beauty in transience and loss as well, beauty that will touch us for the briefest of moments and then disappear, leaving us only with the memory of its light. Just as life, with all its noble aspirations and lofty ideals, will inevitably end in dust and decay.
And in spite of the brevity and apparent meaningless-ness of life, most of us are rather glad to be here, are we not? Nothing lasts forever, but while they do exist we will do well to enjoy the moment.
We must first learn to accept whatever life tosses us without rancour or greed. And when that is done, neither regret past mistakes nor yearn for what is past and gone and will never return.
And through it all rest in the knowledge that there are no unhappy endings in the story that we craft for ourselves.
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