It's already been six months since my missionary left. I am really amazed at how quickly time does pass and sometimes it catches me by surprise. Like right now. I don't wish for it to pass more quickly, well, not always. I recognize that that is ingratitude and each day is important. My life is only a sum of days, whether I used them well or wished them away. I want to enjoy each one.
But sometimes I wander into the realm of nostalgia or saudade. I am feeling a little anxious and nostalgic for the future right now as I approach graduation. There are many things that are still undecided about my life. I suppose there will always be something undecided about life and that is just how it goes. Right now my tentative plan is something like this:
1. Graduate in April, finish my last classes spring term
2. Move back home to Oregon
3. Get a job there and pay off as much debt as I can
4. Take the GRE this fall
5. Apply to grad programs this winter
6. Keep working
7. Keep writing my missionary
8. If I get into a grad program, go back to school in September 2009
9. See what happens when my missionary gets home in November 2009
I am trying to focus on the things that I do have control over, like my schooling, instead of things I don't have complete control over, like what happens with my missionary. I feel actually very accepting of my life right now and I am happy. It would just be inhuman not to feel anxious at this point. When the present gets to be too much, I go to my favorite place. As my missionary put it, it's "that old, quiet house with the curtains drawn and the lamps lit, that I've never lived in. I think that house is named 'nostalgia."
He goes even further saying, "Can't you just see the two of us - two authors in some remodeled farmhouse surrounded by trees? Piles of books next to the fireplace and by the stairs, portraits of Virginia Woolf and Pushkin in the kitchen, a mug of pens by the front door - just in case..." It sounds like heaven to me. Now don't criticize him and say he's distracted. He's just human. I loved the image and while it is not real yet, it gives me hope for the future, "a point to walk toward on the horizon," as he once said too. And is it wrong to hope? I don't think so.
So I walk forward toward the horizon. And sometimes I'm scared. Sometimes I'm hopeful. Sometimes overwhelmed. Today I felt a little mix of all three.
Days
Each one is a gift, no doubt.
mysteriously placed in your waking hand
or set upon your forehead
moments before you open your eyes.
Today begins cold and bright,
the ground heavy with snow
and a thick masonry of ice,
the sun glinting off the turrets of clouds.
Through the calm eyes of the window
everything is in its place
but so precariously
this day might be resting somehow
on the one before it,
all the days of the past stacked high
like an impossible tower of dishes
entertainers used to build on stage.
No wonder you find yourself
perched on top of a tall ladder
hoping to add one more, Just another Wednesday,
you whisper,
then holding your breath,
place this cup on yesterday's saucer
without the slightest clink.
Billy Collins
Each one is a gift, no doubt.
mysteriously placed in your waking hand
or set upon your forehead
moments before you open your eyes.
Today begins cold and bright,
the ground heavy with snow
and a thick masonry of ice,
the sun glinting off the turrets of clouds.
Through the calm eyes of the window
everything is in its place
but so precariously
this day might be resting somehow
on the one before it,
all the days of the past stacked high
like an impossible tower of dishes
entertainers used to build on stage.
No wonder you find yourself
perched on top of a tall ladder
hoping to add one more, Just another Wednesday,
you whisper,
then holding your breath,
place this cup on yesterday's saucer
without the slightest clink.
Billy Collins
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