I have times of crushing exhaustion. Too tired to even swipe my face free of makeup, I head to bed, catching myself at the last minute to head right instead of left, to enter the bath instead of the bed & clean my face. I sometimes am not as thorough as I want to be, but I do what I can so as not to wake with bits of mascara or smears of eye pencil which I so love to wear.
These times occur mostly after meals, healthy or not. The food, which should energize activity & move me to take on more – or at least finish what I’ve started – knock me out instead. My eyes close over the book & sleep wells up so I nod over the pages. I “lose time,” returning to activity depleted more – the nod-out not even restorative. I nap at 6, wake at 8, returning to the bed at 10. The good news is by 4 I’m back & setting up coffee, brushing Hanna Bell, writing notes to friends… By 5:55, I’m gathering purse & water bottle, heading to they gym to push & pull, to walk & lift, to swing & balance. I come home to fruit & flax cereal, setting out once again for work by 8.
I’ve been blaming age, the heat, my use of a lifelong right eye dominance. It’s difficult, channelling an entire universe through one orb. Tiring (that word again!), enervating. And it’s a lifelong pattern, this losing speed & spunk with darkness. Perhaps it is simply the light inspires me to activity while darkness sets upon me like a succubus. I don’t hear the stopper pop, but the well of energy drains away.
Lately I feel the years settling upon me like a colorful cape fading somewhat. I am exalted by the number I’ve achieved & fearful of losing to them as well. Where this me will go is unimportant. I’m happy with the progress I’ve made, the influence I’ve held. I haven’t built cathedrals, but there are many tiny shelters for hiding away in, there is much nourishment stored in the words I’ve put together, the paragraphs planed from formlessness.
Once a seer asked me if I’d like to know who I’d been in the past, assuring me I was world-famous. Once another assured me I’d have that fame once more but “posthumously.” I live by the sea now; I know tracklessness. I’ve lived in the desert, too, where a footprint can last a thousand earth-years.
That I wink in & out of time & timelessness is appropos to my years. That I may spend more time on one side of the veil than the other is a balance more delicate to navigate when I hold the edge of the bureau to pull on my pants. I once heard a fellow say, “The older I get, the farther away the floor seems to be.” This is a truism as well as a grin.
If the only one I’ve made happy is a random reader, it is enough. If my life satisfied one whim, one promise, one wish, it is enough. If I cannot measure in full any longer, oh well. I’ve built none but stone cairns & buried much beneath them. I’ve made myself happy & had others laugh with me. I’ve taught the light a few things & carried darkness to the outer edges of my life, far from direct experience, leaving it there for the kind of jackals that gnaw this fare to feast well. I am amazed constantly in my ability to move forward when all I want is to turn back, make a pillow of my past to rest upon.
I have no symphonies gathered in a trunk for some child-genius to happen upon, no recipes to feed the masses, no prayers to bring on salvation, except in the personal. My life is an excerpt, a condensing, a draft & a draught of what a life should be, can be, & in my case, is.
That will have to serve.
It is past 10:00. I close my eyes again & pull up the covers. If my life is only a dream: it is Enough.
Riding the Light 