There are rumblings in my heart. The kind that are worth something if you let them take the time to fester about and turn into something. The grumbled up thoughts that are usually buried underneath distractions and noise and too much input.
I heard them first last night when I took myself to the movie. I wanted to see “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” because the 1947 Danny Kaye version made me smile, the scenery in the trailer looked amazing, and I was completely in charge of my own time for the first time in months. It was cold enough in the theater to hunker under my coat AND leave my gloves on. (Jason – you might want to consider paying that electric bill…..)
Iceland, Greenland and New York City flowed across the screen – along with a gentle story line that reminded me that I just have to start living again. Myself. Me. Not vicariously — on my own.
I am not a by-product of the family I care for, or the students I teach, or the members of my church. I am a vital individual put on this earth to carry out God’s work in whatever method he plops in front of me — with an open mind and a caring heart. Along the way I use talents that are mine to use for this purpose. I should be ‘present’ within all of that, don’t you think?
Remember when you went to college and realized that you were able to ‘be’ whomever you wanted to present yourself as being? No preconceptions from anyone — just stepping out as you thought you wanted to be — new, exciting and ready to take on the world. Well. I am ready to try that feeling on again. Only this time I don’t have to march forward where no one knows me. No, I just need to step out from under the box I have been hiding within. At church we talk about not hiding our light under the basket. I haven’t tucked my light under a basket — I’ve continued to share it as I was meant to — but I have either had a bag over my head OR put on heavy goggles OR a sleeping mask or something. Because I haven’t seen any of my light for quite awhile. I hear about it. I’m told it exists. I just don’t acknowledge it to myself in the least. All business all the time.
So, I guess I’ll let this rumble around a little bit more. I loved the movie. I came home and read for awhile. And I got out my journal. I wrote.
I’ll write. That always does the trick. I’ll keep you posted.
Farewell, 2013. I may look back on you fondly one day — but I seriously doubt it. You were harsh. You were the kind of challenging that doesn’t encourage growth. You were, well – exasperating. And no, you aren’t a ‘who’ or even a ‘what’. But I will continue to use your name in vain for a bit longer. Then I will move on.
wanderingoutinleftfield 