Smiles

Mother Teresa said, "Peace begins with a smile."  

Siddhartha finally found that a smile is the manifestation of nirvana.  

I didn't know Mother Teresa or Siddhartha, but I knew a woman who was a nurse--both by nature and profession, and she spent at least the last 12 years of her life practicing patience, being present, finding beauty in absolutely everything, and trusting in the order of the Universe. Yesterday, I learned that one month ago today, she lost her fight with cancer and died peacefully with a smile on her face.  

...Cause He's the Tax Man!

In the first grade, my teacher posed a question to the class about what each of our parents did for work:  Doctor, plumber, farmer...when it was my turn I said, "My dad does taxes."  The teacher laughed.  I didn't understand.  I still don't understand.  Taxes aren't funny, and my dad IS an accountant.

 Two days ago he called concerned that he hadn't yet seen our tax documents for 2008.  He wondered if we had used someone else.  What?  That's crazy!  My dad is an accountant.  I would never dream of trusting this delicate issue to the mind of another number cruncher.  Since my first grade career day experience, as far as I'm concerned, my father is the only accountant in the entire world who matters.  He's absolutely the best, most honest, meticulous, intelligent man in the accounting world.  Today is his super bowl, and I know he'll be running that adding maching until the clock strikes midnight.  

Good luck, Dad, and don't worry...ever the procastinator, I've filed an extension.  Our government is democratic afterall.

A Work in Progress

Quote of the Day

Discontent is the first necessity of progress.

Thomas A. Edison 

"First" being the key word here.  Before there were 30 flats (900 individual plants) of thyme sitting in my front yard, there was discontent.  Of course, the discontent happened long before the thyme.  Discontent happened about two years ago when I realized I was breaking up with the lawn.  I didn't love it.  It didn't love me.  We really had nothing in common.  When we first got together, the lawn was a novelty to me, and I was determined to make this work.  

Other homeowners--people who have a deep and lasting love for their own lawns--tried to warn me that this relationship was futile.  Outsiders could see that we were just too different from each other, the lawn and me.  The most glaring difference is my concern for water conservation.  I'm stingy with the water.   Running the sprinklers feels like a sin, and I become overwhelmed with pangs of guilt when I hear the system kick on after the sun sets on warm summer evenings.  The lawn...well, it doesn't really care that we live in a desert.  It's thirsty all the time--a habit I couldn't convince it to break.  That's what tore us apart--that and it's need for synthetic treatments to keep the bugs and weeds at bay. I like birds and clean ground water too much to abide by these filthy habits. 

The old bitter, lawn, was too crippled to pick itself up and walk away on its own, so I tried killing it...softly...with words, and song, and lack of water, and that's when I discovered just how tenacious this thing is.  For all it's weaknesses, it really has a will to survive. It doesn't want to work in my yard on my terms, but it also doesn't want to go away.  It's like Bartelby the Scrivener.   I ask it to please stop growing, please stop taking up space on my property, please pick up your old useless roots and vacate the premises.  It replies, "I'd prefer not to." 

Well, I had to move on.  I couldn't lie to myself anymore, and I stopped pretending with the lawn a long time before I boxed up most of his stuff and sent it to the landfill.  He's still trying to come around.  It's ridiculous!  Can't he see I love thyme now?  I've always loved thyme.  We're soul mates, I believe.  This is why there are 30 flats of red flowering thyme waiting to move into the earth around my house.  It's progress.  Progress born from discontent.  

Comment to the Comment

I was going to post this as a comment to the comment to "Life's Not Fair", but I realized my comment was turning in to more of a rant, so I'm posting it here:

People have ALWAYS wanted fairness. It's true, things have never been fair; but that doesn't stop us from longing. Mostly I was lamenting here that I'm human and have a need to do human things such as sleep and eat. But I have an equally human need to do the things that feed my soul. Sometimes I have to choose between the two.  Those are the choices that don't SEEM fair. I know too that "seem" is mostly a useless word--it's one of those intransitive verbs that doesn't really show the reader anything concrete. Perhaps I should have used a more definitive word? That's the difficulty in talking about fairness; since it doesn't exist, I can't exactly talk about it in terms of action or even a state of being. I can only talk about it in terms of what it is not and in terms of what it gives the impression of being.

Life's Not Fair

Late at night, like right now, it doesn't seem fair to have to choose between sleep and writing.  In the mornings it doesn't seem fair to have to choose between sleep and running.  Or between running and eating.  Or between eating and getting to work on time.  

But life's not fair...so.

Week Subsides to Week

...So Eden sank to grief.

So Dawn goes down to day.

My words won't come out to play. 

This is all I can do.  But it is Friday after all.  Maybe next week will be better. Maybe it will stop snowing.  Maybe the economy will rebound.  Maybe my house will learn to clean itself.