Productivity

I am on a crusade against procrastination! I decide Sunday that I will be productive. I will get myself organized and ready for move number two this year. To that end, I find myself in the garage, perusing through boxes of my own artifacts, deciding which need to get sorted through first.

On top of a tower of Rubbermaid tubs, unbeknownst to me, is a can of paint. Green, “celery sage” to be exact. Thank you Eddie Bauer. As I shift a box to determine its contents, the garage slips into time warp as the paint can tumbles, in slow motion, end over end, on an agonizing trajectory towards the cement slab of floor. I reach, struggle, but my fingers are just seconds too slow. The butt end of the can contacts first, and suddenly the garage rejoins real time, as an explosion of celery sage bursts open, the lid flying, spattering my luggage, dripping down my hair and permanently redecorating my favorite pair of running shorts. It sounds like a gunshot, the mess is unreal.

Here is where it gets really good however: Apparently I made some sort of outburst in the expletive arena, though I can’t precisely recall, because my roommate came running just in time to see the paint pooling on the garage floor beneath my feet, and the tie-dyed spectacle the garage had taken. I cannot stop laughing. My roommate is not amused.

The look on her face is sheer terror, and I find out moments later why:

The landlady arrives in less than half an hour to show the house to its new potential renters.

Stalled Out

I love the way Portland smells during spring rain. Even in the busiest moment the nectar scents of summer’s advent can persuade the most productive membranes into a daydream.

Daydreaming has been a favorite pasttime of mine lately, see, I was lucky to have a brief window, a meager almost two years where I thought I had my life in order. What’s that saying, ‘as soon as you think you are where you want to be, you’re not there anymore.”

As soon as I thought that, it was gone. The universe has ways of throwing curve balls you’ll never expect, and heaters you could never negotiate. I like to think I’m becoming comfortable with the uncertainty, but even that strategy will somehow tease the tenacity right out of you.

I always lusted after the grand adventures, Indiana Jones, Robinson Crusoe, Ulysees, the things I dreamt of at night were always the stuff of legend, epic voyages of exploration. I got my wish, but in no way is it the sort of adventure I had spent my young years acting out in the backyard. Mine I suppose are exploits of a more introspective nature, of finding the bravery of a kind I never knew existed within me. Finding the courage to corral a life out of control on a pell mell trajectory.

I'm beginning to see that a big part of my journey is learning how to get out of my own way. (And realizing how complicated that can really be.) Realizing I've been on hiatus from writing, any serious writing anyway, for almost a year. It gets stopped up and comes spilling out at inopportune times reminding me that this is a calling I can not neglect.