A Narrow Line

The remnants of tropical storm Nichole blew through last night, waking me up and allowing me to enjoy the roar of the wind.

I’ve been thinking about time these past few days. Lingering on things that went wrong, moments that went gloriously right. Wondering about what’s going to become of me in the future, and whether that even matters or not. I like to think I do my best, but how can I know for sure, and why does that even matter? Time grinds along, uncaring, with or without me. Perhaps the man is a touch too melancholy.

Sometimes when you get caught in the wind, all you can do is ride it out.

It’s time to be proactive. I’m making lists and flowcharts, planning and plotting and analyzing, trying to see if I can see interpret the flow of things and expand on the napkin map. What’s the bigger pattern? Am I drifting off course? What’s over the horizon? Big questions, no answers.

A trip this weekend was especially invigorating. I’m exhausted still, but filled with new ideas and sights and sounds and smells.

I’m constantly amazed at how things rarely work out the way I expect them to. I suppose I should have learned by now.

It’s been a good period for me creatively. I’ve got a number of projects percolating, and am making good art. There’s a lack of focus to it all, however, and it’s begging for some sort of unifying direction. I want to make something especially amazing and share it.

I’ve been caught up on a quote by Stewart Brand, from his book The Clock of the Long Now: “The price of routine rush is futureless melodrama.” It’s a great way of describing the thrashing I tend to catch myself getting involved in, in what I am guessing is an attempt by part of me to feel fully alive. If there’s not drama, create some. Stir the pot.

What I love about the quote is the prospect of future-full melodrama. Melodrama that means something, that turns the wheel, that leads down the path. Drama that results in the creation of something new and potentially amazing. That drama, I think, cannot be self-fabricated, but must be entered into.

Let us quietly mark the first year of a Narrow Line.

The course has been set, and we’re moving ever so slowly into autumn. As the days shorten and the air cools, with it comes a mix of wistfulness and hope. Fall is where the Romantic dwells.

Things are not going to plan, to the point where I’ve chucked the plan out the window, and this is surprisingly liberating. The plan wasn’t bad, just not matching up with the realities of life. I have replaced it with something that feels scrawled on the back of a cocktail napkin, just right for now. I’m slowly (slowly) building my massage clientele, programming, taking good care of myself and playing lots of music as I navigate just a few seconds into the future at a time. For now, this is a good way to live.

Rough waters this summer. My emotional state is like a fine wine, full of varied and often contradictory notes. Beyond a general sense of drifting, your guess is as good as mine as to how I feel most of the time. I feel like a perspective change is in order, but it’s not presented itself yet.

In response to this inner whirling, it’s important to do what I can to stay grounded. The little activities and routines of daily life provide an anchor to keep me from going hopelessly adrift.

Sometimes using words is inadequate. We must communicate the ineffable in other ways, with music or art or poetry, with our whole being.

Sometimes even that’s not enough.

Running in the heat is a glorious effort. Sweat pours from my body, my muscles and lungs working to propel me forward on the sidewalk. In the initial moments there is a struggle, a fight against the work, but soon it is resolved, the barrier falls and there is nothing left but running. Nothing but the effort. There is repose there, in the eye of the storm.

I am in Texas presently, enjoying time with my family. When I land back in Boston, there’s a host of raw newness to deal with. It’s hard not to worry about it at times, even when there’s nothing to be done.

I’ve gotten around, finally, to reading Perdido Street Station, which is as good a novel as I was told it was. The concept of transition is strong in the book, and it resonates with me. That place of transition is a narrow line, if it’s there at all. What would it be like to be fearless of that, to set up shop there permanently? Is it possible or desirable? I don’t know.

I know that I feel the transitions ahead, see them on the horizon. I’m not afraid, nor do I welcome them with joyous open arms. I wait and anticipate, and have my share of worry.

There is something endlessly nourishing about the ocean.

I’ve been to the beach twice this week. On Tuesday I went to Marblehead, and this morning I spent a few hours at Crane Beach in Ipswitch. I didn’t realize how much I needed these trips until I came back. It was medicinal.