Busy

Seriously, co-dwellers of earth, how do we get so much done? We collectively cavort into the world with our own personal smorgasbord of a cellphone in one palm and a beverage in the other, family demands dialed up, a yoga mat slung over one shoulder, an environmentally responsible packed lunch, clothes for the party we don’t have time to go home before, an iTunes playlist, interview outline and work appointments, a briefcase, a laptop bag, a gym bag, a diaper bag, cloth grocery shopping bags, an emergency snack bag, dirty clothes bag on the way to the cleaners, a sack of library books, a Groupon for dinner, a book bag filled with homework, tax forms folders heralding the approaching deadline, and a magic list written on the back of a used envelope to keep all the various bits in order. 

 

We are busy, are we not?  And nonetheless we are rocking it through many things with great success.  Hundreds of thousands of humans of all ages get where they are supposed to be mostly prepared with the things needed every day.  Congratulations.

 

Busy is defined pertinently as an adjective at dictionary.com in three entries.
1.  actively and attentively engaged in work or a pastime
2.  not at leisure; otherwise engaged
3.  full of or characterized by activity

 

I don’t know precisely what each of us carries, but I know it is substantial.  Bills hypothetically on our backs, buzzers and reminders on a portable phone travel with us everywhere, beliefs that shape us slip between synapses in our brains.  Everywhere.  Texting, talking, timekeeping, telling ourselves we will catch up on sleep on the weekend at which time, when we find some time for ourselves, we hate to “waste” it sleeping.  We are flattered to be called any of the synonyms listed at dictionary.com for busy (assiduous, hard-working, diligent, industrious, earnest, employed, occupied, working) and not so much the antonyms (indolent and unoccupied). 

 

I want to write my blog today but my thoughts are all over the place Monday manic.  In today’s to-do soup there is so much savory stuff I want to do, an equal scoop of goop I need to do, the stock of what I truly absolutely must do and the ingredients to leave out – that which I absolutely will not get to.  So, like a good stew maker, I’m winging it with what’s on hand, the first thoughts that come to my mind.  May they settle in your belly as a comfort of something shared, an offering of my love of words and a partaking in the solidarity of being busy.

I drop two quotes about busy into my pot for thought today.

It is not enough to be busy.  So are the ants. 
The questions is:  What are we busy about?   
                                                - Henry David Thoreau
 

I try to keep it real.  I don’t have time to
worry about what I’m projecting to the
world. I’m just busy being myself. 
                                               – Demi Lovato

 

Beverage

Life recently sent me shopping for a vehicle.  My old van was a 2002; the new one is a 2010.  This kid carrying, stuff hauling bit of my life has a bunch of buttons and beeps I have to figure out.  And, there are fifteen cup holders.  In total the vehicle safely holds a seat-belted seven people.  How many drinks does each person need?  Apparently two, with a spare third as a perk for the driver.  I queried other van driving folks in my life (not exactly scientific, I know) and found that they too have such an amenity.  It perplexes me to consider that multiple options to rest a beverage seem a standard feature on modern minivans.  Somebody did some research and found our beverage habits to be important to our comfort. 

Dictionary.com defines the noun beverage as “any potable liquid, especially one other that water, as tea, coffee, beer, or milk.”

Beverages are important.  Today’s musings took root on a morning when I left the house with three:  water, protein smoothie, and a perfectly opaque black decaffeinated coffee.  I invented a new use for my sectioned cloth wine shopping bag – perfect to carry several lidded drinks upright.  These were necessary beverage rations for the morning and afternoon ahead of me.  So, I get it.  We need lots of cup holders.  I wanted at first to think my abundant cup holders were a useless indulgence.  Then I used them - all three allotted me.   

Beverages matter.  They can support us or poison us.  A beverage can be essential as water although is more often defined as something a step up the “special” ladder from H20 as in tea, coffee, beer, or milk (the favorites listed in the previous definition).   People work to provide the perfect beverage for holidays and celebratory occasions, matching wines and kid friendly punches to their respective places at tables and parties.  A certain, specifically offered potable liquid might soothe, supplicate, sedate or intoxicate.  Another beverage might be sipped to energize or offer a meal’s worth of liquid nutrition.  A beverage is crucial for a toast.  We need the properly prescribed ancient drink to consecrate at an altar.  One historically high-octane beverage distilled a hard and fast living for folks scraping life from mountains, fire and corn.

 

Why ponder the beverage?  Maybe because for most of us it is often abundant, easy to prepare and carry.  And when not, what feeling other than thirst gives us greater connection with longing?  Tangible.  Insistent.  Physical.  Spiritual.       
 

I scrounged online for these two beverage thoughts - one a laugh, one a lesson. 

 

Our founding fathers would have never tolerated any of
this crap.  For God’s sake, they were blowing people’s
heads off because they put a tax on their breakfast beverage. 
And it wasn’t even coffee.  
                                                                               - Dennis Miller

 

If we eat any food, or drink any beverage, we must recite a
blessing over them before and after.                                                                              
                                                                               - Shmuel Y. Agnon