Awake

I am having a hard time becoming cognizant today.  Seriously.  I’m wracking my brain to think of what happened in order to be so groggy today.  Did I stay up too late Sunday night?  No.  Drink an overgenerous amount of wine with dinner?  No.  Have to attend to a child in the middle of the night?  Need to get up mid sleep cycle to use the bathroom?  Have unpleasant dreams?   No.  No.  No.  None of the typical culprits offer rationale for the marshmallow brain and lead body I have as I struggle to become awake today. 

Dictionary.com defines awake.
                verb -
                1.  to wake up; rouse from sleep
                2.  to rouse to action; become active
                3.  to come or bring to an awareness; become cognizant (often followed by to)
                noun -
                1.  waking; not sleeping
                2.  vigilant; alert

My instincts as I strive to come to awareness direct me to investigate my behaviors or previous circumstances to find a mistake on my part or unplanned event because my body wants more rest.  Turns out nothing negative occurred.  Maybe it is not something I have done wrong either.  I could want more sleep because with Friday’s equinox summer is officially over, fall is here, the mornings are dark and this particular Monday is misty gray.  What human body wouldn’t want to stay in bed a little longer at least until some natural light existed?   I am typing in the dark!  The problem may not be something I did specifically but something I have done generally – agreed to a rather unnatural rhythm of daily American work and school week life. 

My family was lucky enough to sleep into daylight over the weekend.  There is something satisfying about waking naturally instead of via alarm, or in the case of my children, via me.  Although I’d like to consider myself a bit gentler than the blare of an alarm, I still am the thing that must rouse my kids from sleep.  I watch their bodies stretch and limbs unfurl, eyes blink and legs kick covers into a heap at the bottom of the bed.  They look at me in disbelief, certain I must be mistaken about the time.  I reassure them I am not.  They wish I was.  Then we roll into action.  Like perfectly trained puppies they potty, dress, eat, pack, depart, arrive. 

Active?  Yes.  Alert?  Maybe not, but on the way to awake following our established routine path of Monday morning.

Awake

Summer’s end morning, still deep dark despite

the glowing timepiece heralding death of night

marking the finish of restless mystic dreaming

warm breath revving ruby blood to offer oxygen

eyes and feet follow a path to the cosmic kitchen

where food offered is taken, eaten, unthought-of

day breaks, snaps into sight a single sleepy face

of what is to be in places yesterday once lived.

Revise

I am in the blessed place of revising my first collection of poetry, Garden.  This brings such energy and revisiting the poems motivates me.  While in this watery realization that the dream is becoming real, I am supposed to make corrections or changes before the work goes to print.  Permanent print. 

 

What if I miss something?  What if I am careless?  What if my prologue words are crystal clear to me and muddily goobidly gook to readers?  Is my personal love of double justified margins just a pain in the neck for my editor?  Am I too slow as I revise the book while simultaneously attempting to keep my family’s life running?

Dictionary.com provides the following definition of the verb revise.
1.  to amend or alter
2.  to alter something already written or printed in order to make corrections, improve or update
3.  British - to review (previously studied materials) in preparation for an examination

As I ponder the unalterable reality of printed work my mind draws lines to a recent conversation about regrets.  We nodded affirmatively that we might not change our life paths even if there are moments that make us wonder what we were thinking.  Moments where our own actions put us in an unpleasant place, felt like they were going to keep us down forever, or tested us beyond our expectations.  You know the conversation:  the would-a, could-a, should-a tap dance reflecting on our life choices. 

If I was offered the manuscript of my life in its messy first draft, what would I correct?  Would I risk missing a needed change?  Or alter something I would later wish I had left alone?  Would I be too darn picky about little things that don’t matter or are largely unnoticed by anyone else?  Can I attest with certainty that I would improve it?

We cannot edit our lives as poetry but don’t we sometimes really want to?  We mull what we might do if we had just one opportunity to do better at some place or moment in the past we determine today needs fixing.  I am sometimes guilty of believing I know more now despite the fact that “then” was “now” at the time I lived it.  I was certain about many things that don’t look so clear-cut in hindsight.  Is this ego thinking we know more than we did “back then?”  Maybe my knowledge resulted from “back then!”

I accept what has passed as indelible but not ensnaring.  We are not only our past because we have our present and future to choose (then hope to revise later?).  Time should be spent living new days and shutting down mental updates imposed on moments gone by.  Turns out, we only get one draft of each day so we’d better use our favorite pen and offer our best effort.  If I thought more about the permanency of my actions would that change the way I act today and maybe my yen to revise later? 

Why

My daughter can trap me in a round of questions.  Her initial inquiry may vary but when my response is, “No,” she asks, “Why?”  I explain and she again asks, “Why?” Off we go into what feels like an infinite loop – we never get out unless I shut it off.  I realize the futility of our discourse.  There is no satisfaction for either of us.  Even though I long to offer resolution I have not the answer to satiate the why and she both wants reasons and enjoys the game.

At dictionary.com Collins World English Dictionary offers this entry for the adverb why.
                a. for what reason, purpose, or cause?:  why are you here?
                b. (used in indirect questions):  tell me why you’re here.

Today I am the asking child with perpetual need to wonder why?  The difference for me is there is no joy in the game.  I have no desire to trap the recipient of my question in a tangle of queried responses.  I really want to know how come a lot of things occur. 

There is so freaking much tragedy that goes without explanation.  We can certainly begin with September 11, 2001 which is fresh in our hearts today after marking its ten year anniversary yesterday.  Then perhaps start across the globe and bring it on home again - conflict in Somalia, unrest in the Middle East, sex scandals in churches, dishonest corporate practices, abusive and dysfunctional families, unemployment, failed relationships, homelessness, gossip.  

I accept that my vision is a small speck of what is possible and I am limited in perception by human senses and a human lifespan.  But sometimes it sure feels hard to plod along not knowing why suffering exists and how we are to thrive amidst so much unexplained harmful human behavior.

That may be part of the answer to my seeking - human.  That is a variable, isn’t it?  Created in the image and likeness of Love and set on our way to make the best of it.  People imbued with free will and the nature of both good and evil swing the pendulum sometimes.  Grand scale destroyers really make a senseless mark.   I acknowledge the randomness of nature because it has no choice, but the acts of people are where my weary wonder rests today.  Certainly humans don’t control catastrophic weather or natural disasters but people do choose to harm one another or not.  We also can choose to help, to create, to uplift. 

Perhaps my needing to know reasons is a piece of my pain puzzle.  Will it ever all make sense?  No.  Why?

Why

Love, what can you teach
me without the volume
of pain, is there no thing

to gain another way
to say I’m strong, Love
enough to take your lesson

with question for what
about the answers I need
reason or cause, a test

eye cannot help but look
toward reprieve as the rest
of the story we are writing.

Five

I know five isn't typically considered sacred.  Seven, twelve and forty get a lot of holy mention and I accept their awesome place - days of the week, number of months, days in the dessert, etc.  I want to mull a number that turns up divine for me all the time, five.

Dictionary.com offers five entires in the wonderful definiton of five.
1.      a cardinal numer, four plus one
2.      a symbol for this number, as 5 or V
3.      a set of this many persons or things
4.      a playing card, die face, or half of a domino face with five pips
5.      (informal)  a five-dollar bill

What is five for me? 

The number of people in my household both growing up and at present.  I swore I would have an even number of kids so my family would have an even number of members.  Didn’t work out. 

Five is the time period in minutes offered by mothers to warn their children that it is almost time to go, time to eat, time for bed, whatever Mommy says should happen.  This set of five minutes comes from a desire to keep to the child-rearing protocol of allowing lead time into transitions.  Hypothetically providing lead time into transitions makes them easier.   

Five is also the age in years at which a child begins to figure out the arbitrary meaning of five minutes when Mommy announces it.  Mommy minutes often have a wide range of durations.

Five is the number of pounds I am storing in my thighs in case of emergency.  I am giving myself this idea about “smart storage” because, really, it is the number of pounds I estimate that I am unwilling to give up entirely chocolate cake or Waffle House to lose.

The number of miles over the posted speed limit I feel I can drive safely without worry of losing control or being ticketed by a police officer is five.

Toes per foot and fingers per hand.  These remarkable digits are capable of dexterity from birth to one year that fades over time and is never again matched.  Serioulsy, watch the individual movement of a newborn’s toes – amazing!  Seems once we learn to walk toes need to work as a team.

The number of work or school days in a standard American week.  

Five is the magic number of minutes everyone claims to need before getting out of bed.

The number of Krispy Kreme glazed donuts a person should know is probably one too many to digest comfortably, really.

The number of steps beyond which I will likely deem a recipe not worth the trouble.

Cards needed in a standard poker hand.

The number of hours past my usual time I am writing today!  Seems I had a languid holiday morning with my family and gave myself five mommy minutes more to sleep, then to eat and another set to get started on my blog.