Due to circumstances which were actually not beyond my control but I chose to instead ignore, I'm feeling sort of reflective today.
If you see me
Can you tell me if I'm sleeping?
If you hear me
Can you tell me what I'm dreaming?
There's nothing here to be afraid of
It's just the morning
Excerpt from Lyle Lovette's fine tune "It's Just The Morning"
There's an often repeated saying that one hears as the aging process continues to carve its inevitable lines and creases throughout one's life. It goes something along the lines of that one's "memory is the first thing to go" as one sooner or later begins to forget the trivial matters that seem to take precedence over our lives on a daily basis. Maybe it's something stupid like misplacing your car keys or forgetting something at the grocery store. When you think about it and try and distance yourself from the moment, those kinds of things are impersonal at best. They tend to live in the moment but in the grand scheme of things, have no relevance whatsoever in what's really important and with the passage of time, will soon be forgotten.
In a way, I wish that saying were true but I'm here to try and tell you that it's not. At least not in my case. I guess another little scrape with the grim reaper was finally enough to change my perspective on a few things.
When I think about people in general, I usually try and equate them with some type of story. After all, we each have at least one. Some of those stories are meant to be shouted from the rafters for all to hear, some of them are intended to be told in hushed tones like secrets that are meant for only two sets of ears, some of them are repeated so often that they are greeted with raised eyebrows and that "here we go again" feeling and some stories, well, some stories never get to be told. Maybe the timing of the telling was never right or maybe the person doesn't think it was worth the telling in the first place. Either way, they die with the person that should be telling them.
Those are the stories that I feel sorry for. The ones that never see the light of day and remain hidden away lost to the world. They never get to cast their light no matter how dim or to be told no matter how small the audience. They remain anonymous except to the would be storyteller.
When I got home from the hospital the other day, three or four jalapeno's that had sprouted from seed in my little garden had changed from tiny little flowers into something recognizable and something you would buy at the grocery store. I wasn't there to see it happen and I probably wouldn't have taken much notice in the first place even if I was. It was just another everyday event in the everyday world that goes unnoticed by each and every one of us. I'm sure it's not intentional but we seem to get lost in the wonder of things. I guess it's whole thing about taking stuff for granted and that things will be the same tomorrow as they were today. I wonder how much else has changed even in-between the typing of these lines on the computer?
I'll spare you all the gory details but the doctors told me I was about two hours from being permanently gone. That if I hadn't made my way to the hospital, I'd have passed out and made a quiet but painful exit. A couple of days later, they tell me that there's some scarring done and most likely some permanent damage to my heart. They have me lined up for all kinds of prescriptions to lower my heart rate, reduce my cholesterol, lower my blood pressure and God knows what else. While I'm gonna heed their advice this time around, I'm also gonna try and do something else. I'm gonna try and think of all the nice messages and acts of kindness and concern that came my way over the past couple of days and somehow try and repay them.
I don't know how I'll ever be able to do that. Maybe a card or a message or a phone call here and there will help express my gratitude to all of you. Maybe I'll go out and commit one or two of those "random acts of kindness" that I keep seeing advertised on bumper stickers when I'm stuck in traffic. Maybe I'll try and stop scaring the shit out the many people who I knew loved me and the many people I just discovered that feel that way too.
On the other hand, on top of all of that, maybe I'll just keep trying to tell stories about what happens everyday so that it doesn't get lost with the passage of time. After all, that's how you really get to know someone.
I've never said this before but I never knew I had so many friends. I have this site to thank for that. A sincere thanks to one and all and as far as the future goes, well, you can expect me to be boring the hell out of you for as long as we're all around.
Because that folks, is what happens everyday. Or at least it's what should be happening.
Love,
Bob and Anna