lost in thought

The journey I’ve done the most the past year is from my computer, and finding myself at the kettle, not really knowing how I got there.

This morning it’s the kettle getting heavy brings me back.  The effort to keep it steady as it fills.  Then noticing, out the window, the way the light falls and the grasses sway, the blue sky, and colours of flowers.  It’s a riot of beauty.  And I realise I’m thinking, ‘So what?’

I’m in a mood, all of a sudden.  No idea why.

Maybe, as I got up from the computer, I glanced outside and saw geraniums swamping everything and needing cutting back.  Or wisteria hanging in clumps and needing pruning.  And hydrangeas covered in bindweed.

Maybe, as I walked to the kitchen I thought, ‘It’s all growing so fast I can’t keep up, and the house needs cleaning too.  I can’t stay on top of things the way other people do.  It’s not even that I’m doing something better with my time.  It’s no wonder I’ve never achieved anything, and my life has been wasted.’

How I travel in seconds, in just a few steps, from the computer and how fast the plants are growing, to the kettle and a damning assessment of my life.  It’s a path that’s worn smooth and easy to follow.  An old habit to go that way, any time I’m not paying attention.

I can’t stop the thoughts, but what if I keep interrupting them?  Keep coming back to the feel of my feet on the floor or clothing against my skin.  And even if I never catch a single thought, still, the whole story might not get a chance to build.

And I might arrive at the kitchen sink, look out at the garden, and be touched by its beauty.

‘I haven’t done a thing today.
– Why?  Have you not lived? 
That is not only the most basic of your employments,
it is the most glorious…’  
– Montaigne

 

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