Past and Present

The relationship of the past to the present is interesting.  I've been thinking that my relationship to the past, as mediated by my shoddy memory, is a bit lacking.  It can be useful, and it's generally seen as virtue, to move on and not get stuck in the past--but you do lose a bit if that is your natural mode.  For instance, right now I'm really needing to remember things that very much pertain to my present, yet they fade.  So I'm in the interesting position of trying to keep memories vivid for the sake of the present moment, to live in the present moment more fully by also entering into the (somewhat recent) past.  It's a paradox.  We often have to live in the paradox.

"I miss you more each day"

I had heard this phrase and always assumed it was just a form of speech, not something literally true.

Don't Speak from a Place of Fear

I have two other things to share that I have recently learned.  One is that it is critical not to speak from a place of fear.  It's also surprisingly hard to do.  Fears and insecurities creep up on one, even when everything is seemingly going fine.  The other thing I have learned is that it is way too easy to be selfish.  This one is a very subtle point, as well.  In general, I thought I had a habit of generosity, but I am realizing more and more how often I fail really to put myself in the other's place, to imagine what he might be going through, etc.  I am fine with day to day things, but the really hard stuff, that's where I come up against my selfishness.  Ah well, it's humbling.

Learning a Lot

Right now, I feel, is a time of intense learning.  I am learning a lot about myself, and about how the expression "love till it hurts" isn't really just a cliché.  I have also learned by heart the code for the e with the acute accent (é)--it is ALT-0233!  I'm also having fun, as always!  The crazier, more ridiculous, matters get, the more important it is to laugh.  We'll see what else I learn in the coming months!

Why Do I Want You?

Why do I want food, or water, or a warm coat in winter?
Why do I smile at a sunny day?
Why, even when we quarrel, is there a lightness in my heart,
A hope, that even in the darkest times
All will be well?

Why do my usual ways of changing,
Hedging, and taming my thought patterns
Never work with you?
You are always in my thoughts;
I am hemmed in and never alone.

Why do I laugh at your jokes,
A laugh that I cannot restrain,
Even if I try to restrain it, even if
My heart is broken and hurting?

Why, then, is just a question,
Without a resolution, an explanation,
A satisfactory conclusion, tying
Together all points of the plot.

Idiot

Right now I feel like an idiot.

I'm the Same

I stumbled across my blog from over ten years ago, and though it was definitely the work of a teenager, it surprised me how much I am the same person now as I was then.  It was sad to read the bits about my family, so unbroken at that point.  It was funny to read the weird, personal details I had chosen to share about myself.  It's still me, though.  I've grown up (gotten prettier, I think, and grown intellectually as well as emotionally and spiritually), but the basic material is the same.