paisleypiper's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- free hour I hate having everything in such a mess. I look at my life at everything I do not accomplish at everything I could accomplish could I be motivated. But this thought pertaining to how my desk and my life are related somehow one is evidence of the state of the other � this thought comes after two hours of sadness and truth. I have no family about which to write. I have no friends about which to write. It�s the middle of the night and I�m tired of everything I am. With the light out, the sky looks impossibly and thickly white, stiflingly dense. I see no evidence of anything higher or beyond this thick, middle of the night, city white sky. The tree outside the window is impossibly still; no breeze blows. And yet this thick white night seems to fill the room although the doors and windows close me off from the night out there it sill fills the room around me. The night out there always in here, always out there. Do you remember the first time you realized that the moon always shines, just the sun shines brighter and drowns it out. The stars always shine, just the sun shines brighter and drowns them out. Drowning out there, amid such a quantity of air is a possibility. Do you remember when you realized that the moon doesn�t shine, but reflects light bouncing off earth? That the moon somehow belongs to us � other planets have more moons, other planets have no moons, but we have one and we�ve been there. Many, many people think we�ve been there. Others are suspicious but this moon question probably does not mark the first time their suspicions have piqued. Do you remember what it felt like to learn that this moon � this lifeless piece of rock � hangs around and pulls our tides back and forth, and helps us keep track of our months and seasons. We put a lot on the moon (that could be why it shines or maybe because it shines we put a lot on it). So many times I�ve thought I had the moon figured out only to find there was more to learn. I begin to feel sleepy, begin to understand what this late night sadness means to me � a indication that I can do better, be more motivated to do things in my life that express my talents (not just work). I�ve spent the better part of six months living only for work, coming home exhausted, and pushing myself to do the rudimentary requirements of life but not much else. Now in the middle of the night I mourn all of that time at the very same time I feel such depression that I may have 50 more years to fill and work won�t go very far. These thoughts are strange brain mates � solution and motivation. I think I�ve been waiting for this letter to arrive that grants me permission to have dreams and pursue them. I�ve been somewhat afraid to really feel my dreams and to want to drive towards them. Who are you to want anything? My bad thoughts say. Who are you to think you could do that? You can�t even keep your desk tidy. More bad thoughts talking. I�ve been thinking, some official letter from the universe could take care of this. I could frame it and put it up over my desk. I�d have credentials, this way. One would think that that is what the hubbub over my master�s degree was about but it seems that this sort of thought was not with me when I sat tearful on the couch upstairs watching the white, still night sky. This sort of practical thought still hadn�t arrived like the sun which will start creeping up in the east, just between houses. I love to write so much that I can start writing convinced that I am a waste of a person who must just hang in there a few more years and then through the process of writing I come to my senses and realize that these sorts of thoughts just drifted into my mind. They arrived like a bad odor comes into a car when driving down the highway � came in from the air and dissipates the further I travel down the open road. The part I�ve got to figure out, in the absence of the letter from the universe, how I am going to stay motivated. Motivation is partially a learned phenomenon, can be reinforced through habit. Sometimes I tell Quinn, just pick something and do it. Don�t worry about what you pick and whether that choice ultimately will be the right choice � it�s just an evening. The important thing is that by just picking something, the evening will be about the activity and not about the deciding. I�ve moved away from my initial thoughts and cannot find them again. Looking for that letter. (Don�t spend your free hour feeling badly.) 1:39 a.m. - 2003-10-26 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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