Wednesday, November 15, 2006

One Day

One day is just like the next. It all averages out. The action is in the minutes.
Take a moment to relax. Have a cup of tea, or coffee if you prefer. Have a biscuit.
Call a friend.
Write in a diary. Don't lose any of those precious moments. Time has a way of eliding their significance.
One day everything will be right, or it may never be. One day never comes. It never happens. You can only concentrate on the moment. Maybe tomorrow you'll take care of it. It happened yesterday. Today's the day. Can you? Did it? Is it, really? The whole day? Or just in the space of an hour?
Have you ever planned and prepared a sumptuous meal? The shopping for it, especially if it contains exotic ingredients, could take a while. The cooking may take more than an hour or two or even longer. Maybe you'll share a nice bottle of wine with your spouse or whoever it is you plan to share this meal with.Oh, it's going to be a glorious repast! You even light candles.You sit down at the table. Spread your napkins in your laps and raise your glasses in a toast. Then dig in. Delicious! And before you know it, one of you turns to the other and remarks, "Oh, all that work, and it's all finished." The essence of that meal was that one moment when you swallowed that last forkful. It may have taken hours to prepare, but it was all building to that point where you had ingested all. That final moment was the meal.
One day is a collection of moments. One day is a formless thing only given some shape by collecting the memory of those moments.
In the Disney movie version of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (I hate that description, but more of that at another time), Snow sings, "One day, my prince will come..." One day, at one particular moment, he will arrive and lift her heart to heights of rapture previously only imagined, but what of the day after he comes? That rapturous moment will become old news, no news. Memories never hold as much emotion as the moments they recall. That only happens in the movies where the moments can be played over and over again as real (or cinematic, if you will) as the first time they occur, and think of this, the first time you see it, you're only seeing the image of something that happened for real on a sound stage months or even years ago. So not even your first time is the real thing for the participants. Even if a tear comes to your eye because you are moved so deeply -- it's their memory, not yours. But it evokes a moment you have experienced. A moment only.
The moment you learned whether it was a boy or a girl, or twins.
The moment you passed and could proceed to the next step.
The moment you said, "I do." The very essence of your wedding day.
The moment you realized you didn't.
The moment you were given praise for a job well done.
Childhood moments of gratification. All those moments gathered together in big bundles of hours. Those were the days.
Can't I get a moment's peace? One day you will have endless peace.
One day, but hopefully not today.

Sunday, November 5, 2006

I need somewhere to put my stuff

This looks like as good a place as any.