I’m sitting in the sunshine as the sun rises. Pretty morning. My walk to this point has been quiet and pleasant. There was no traffic on the highway, either. If the folks in my neighborhood are a representative sample of Americans in the area, most folks who were going somewhere this weekend are gone, and those that were up late firing off various fireworks and noise makers are probably sleeping in; that shit was still going on at midnight.
A misty morning at the trailhead.
I’m enjoying the quiet and the solitude. Somewhere in the distance, I hear an occasional car pass by. My tinnitus is crazy loud this morning, and my back aches ferociously. I breathe, exhale, and relax, pulling my posture more upright. Changing my position doesn’t ease my pain in any noteworthy way, but slumping carelessly definitely tends to make it worse. Choices. I grumble silently to myself; everything seems to require a fucking effort. lol I laugh at myself for resisting the truth of it. Yes, surely things require effort. That’s just real. I sigh to myself and let it go. There’s no use fighting the effort required to do things. The best I can do is to make wise choices about what I am doing and where I’m putting my limited resources as an individual (even down to the effort involved).
Halfway “there” is just a point along the way. The journey is the destination.
…Fuck pain…
I sigh to myself and smile, thinking about yesterday. Nice evening. The Anxious Adventurer made lemon bars. Tasty. I made (a fairly simple, summertime) dinner. Nothing fancy. We enjoyed it together as a family. The weather was fairly mild and not hot, and we had turned off the AC, enjoying the natural breeze through windows open wide to the summer air.
I’ve no clear agenda for the weekend. Routine housekeeping stuff I guess. I sit watching the little birds at the edge of the meadow. I think about old friends and try to distract myself from pain. Maybe it is a good day to get out into the garden? There’s laundry to do, too. I chuckle at myself when I find myself daydreaming about doing housework as I sit here in the sunshine visualizing this or that task I know I am likely to do on a Saturday, and wondering what I can actually accomplish in practical terms. I’d rather sit with my feet up in the garden, sipping iced coffee and ignoring the tick of the clock, but time is a precious and finite resource and I have things to do. Another sigh breaks the stillness.
What next? I don’t know, yet. I’ve got options to consider. Choices to make. I’ve got my own path to walk. For the moment I am content just to be here, now, enjoying the morning sun without attachment to any particular outcome. Later, I can begin again.
It is morning. Well past dawn or sunrise. I’m off work – surgery today. Now and then my anxiety begins to flare up, mostly the result of troubling memories of past surgical experiences. It’s a “nothing” sort of thing. I breathe, exhale, and relax. I pull myself back into this moment. This surgery coming up today is quite minor. It’ll probably be done under a local anesthetic and finished in minutes. Regardless; the outcome will be what it is when that time comes. For now I enjoy my coffee in the garden.
A new day.
So… It’s much later. It’s evening. My anxiety was worse than I expected (or was willing to acknowledge). I’m calling it a night and feeling a bit woozy from the last lingering after effects of the surgical stress, the anesthesia, and the pain medication they gave me for today and tomorrow. I don’t really expect to need it past then, and figure I’ll be on my usual meds in the usual way by Saturday for sure. It went fine. I was surprised that it was done under general anesthesia – seemed the sort of thing that could potentially have been handled with an exacto knife and a moment of moment of excessive frugality, perhaps. lol
… Getting everyday shit done is a tad more complicated by being drugged and one-handed, but it’s temporary…
In practical terms my ability to manage my anxiety skillfully was, at best, superficial and only barely adequate. As a result I managed to aggravate my Traveling Partner (first thing in the morning), who was trying to provide caregiving and support and manage his own worry without adding to my stress. He wasn’t fooled. I did manage to mystify the nurse at the surgical center with my higher-than-200/90 blood pressure when my records show my historical average around 135/70. lol She didn’t see my anxiety at all (and I didn’t explicitly call it out). She said later that I seemed very calm and steady, after I thanked her for helping to calm me before surgery. There’s something to learn from that. One clear takeaway is that “managing” and “masking” are not the same practices and can’t get the same results. I gotta work on that. It matters to choose the right tool for any job.
Still, it’s behind me now. My throat is a bit raw from their method of managing my respiration while I was unconscious. That’s not a complaint, just an observation. I’ll have some water, and a cough lozenge, get a good night’s sleep (I hope), and tomorrow, I’ll begin again.
Have you ever thought about how few people leave any sort of lasting mark on the world, or the lives of others in an individual mortal lifetime? Humanity’s impact on the planet, other life forms, and each other, generally, is pretty obvious (and pretty reliably negative, which is unfortunate), but as individual human beings, by far the vast majority of us will pass through these mortal lives almost unnoticed, and leave no lasting legacy of the life we lived. Maybe, if we’ve worked hard and been quite fortunate, we’ll leave something of value behind, in cash or assets, that our heirs may or may not appreciate in the way that we hoped. Most of us will live, die, and be forgotten.
… That’s a huge downer, isn’t it? My own experiences of “existential dread” most commonly center on this awareness that it’s quite likely I’ll be forgotten once I’m gone…
The closest thing we human beings have that approximates immortality is to have some sort of lasting legacy that endures beyond our limited, all too brief, human lifetime. The written works of writers, philosophers, historians, and storytellers of all sorts may survive thousands of years. The paintings, drawings, and sculptures of visual artists working in durable media may survive many lifetimes beyond the death of the artist who made them. More modern art forms have yet to prove themselves, but recorded music, and film, endures – as long as the means to view them survives. Architects design buildings and crews of builders, engineers, and tradespeople work to bring them into being – where these survive, a name may survive with them, but only one (or few) of many.
I fret about what my own legacy may be, when this brief mortal life ends. Will my art survive? Will it be known, even to some few, or lost over time due to lack of appeal or discarded as lacking value? Will my small but thoughtfully selected porcelain collection become treasured by someone else, or be sold piecemeal as part of clearing out the clutter I left behind? What about my books? My written work? The contents of my email? Will the things that were important to me have lasting importance for anyone else? Will I be remembered? If I am, what will I be remembered for? That seems like an important question, although considering the likelihood that I’ll simply be among the vast forgotten multitudes as soon as I’m gone, the seeming importance of the question may be an illusion.
A sunny summer day, an oak grove, a meadow.
I walked down the trail this morning thinking about legacy and mortality, and meaning and purpose, and wondering again “what we’re here for”. How long after I’m gone will my beloved say my name with longing and love, before his memory begins to fade? Once he’s gone, what then? Who will continue to “say my name” and cling to their memories of me?
I’m not thinking about these things in a sorrowful way, just contemplating what it takes to leave behind an enduring legacy of love and high regard? I am asking myself what I hope to be remembered for? I have come to understand that it isn’t enough simply to be remembered. Some pretty terrible human beings are remembered through history, and I have no interest in being one of those. It’s more complicated than simply being remembered, isn’t it? Hitler is remembered. Andrew Jackson is remembered. Jack the Ripper is remembered. Saddam Hussein is remembered. No doubt Trump will be remembered. These people are not remembered for anything good they did. Their legacy is of trauma and crime, and how terrible human beings can treat other human beings. Their names evoke cautionary admonishments and document terrible deeds. There are worthier things to be known for.
What do you want to be known for? Are you even doing the things that have that potential?
One hot air balloon drifting across a blue summer sky.
I walked and thought. Later I’ll have coffee with a friend, run a couple errands, get the oil changed in my car, and return home to my Traveling Partner’s love. None of that holds any particular potential to leave a lasting “legacy”. These are moments in one human life. Perhaps it is enough to simply live authentically, and to love well, and treat people with kindness and consideration?
I watch the leaves of trees quaking gently in the morning breeze, and enjoy the feeling of sunshine on my back. It’s a lovely morning, and perhaps the best possible choice is to embrace this moment, savor it, and live my life as it is? Maybe it isn’t for us to decide what our legacy could, or may, be at all? I suppose it is eventually in the hands (minds) of others, regardless what we may do to influence or guide that outcome. I breathe, exhale, and relax. I keep walking. I can wonder, but I can’t know – funny to recognize and acknowledge that with such ease. The question of “legacy” now seems potentially an obstacle. A bit of misdirection. Perhaps it is far more important simply to become the person I most want to be, living well, loving deeply, and present, here, now?
I sigh and smile. I hear the clock ticking. I keep on walking. Regardless whether I am remembered or forgotten, I am enjoying this life, and savoring the many little joys in it. Each moment is uniquely its own experience, whether anyone else remembers or not; I’m here, now, living these moments. It’s enough, isn’t it? I think about it awhile longer. Soon, I’ll begin again, grateful for the chance, and the moments.
The ringing in my ears is loud this morning. I pay it no particular attention; it’s reliably always there and the only thing to do about it is to focus on other things. My hot coffee. The chill of the morning at the edge of a meadow surrounded by forest. The distant sound of traffic on the highway, faint but still audible. Voices. I sigh and lace up my boots. A walk after coffee sounds delightful.
… I slept poorly but it hasn’t caught up with me yet…
Light in the darkness.
I woke several times during the night to pee. I guess I’m adequately hydrated. 😆 Each time I stepped out into the darkness, I paused to gaze at the stars a little while. I could see the Milky Way. I would return, following the short path between my campsite and the restroom, guided by the merry string of colored lights that I hung around my tent, specifically to make it easier to find in the dark. The night didn’t begin to feel cold until shortly before daybreak and I was pretty comfortable, just not sleeping restfully.
… The night felt long…
My walk warmed me up more than my morning coffee did. It’s been mostly uphill, and I wound my way through the trees, stepping carefully where the trail was not well-maintained. I reached my goal; the day use area. It took me longer to get here than I expected, but I wasn’t going for speed, only solitude. Walking to leave the sound of voices behind me, and in this instance quite successfully. There’s no one else here right now. It’s lovely and quiet (except for the tinnitus, which no one else hears).
A new day.
My head aches and I am thinking about more coffee, though I certainly had my usual amount (more than). I look over the park map. This trail? That one? What about this other one? It looks new, since my last visit here (which was 2022, I think). It’s probably early enough to find parking at one of the trailheads for the BVT… I yawn and stretch. It isn’t nap time, yet.
I breathe, exhale, and relax. What is my purpose, here? Meditation. Self-reflection. Setting intentions for this next year of living. This, right now, it isn’t really any if those things in a useful way. The miles of trails do seem to connect me with my sense of purpose. I look out at the horizon and wonder how many miles to those hills? The map suggests that those are in the Tillamook State Forest, and about 16 miles away (as the crow flies). It would be more than an hour to drive there, and about 12 to walk it, according to Maps. I think about how often the thing we seek seems so near, but really isn’t near at all. That’s a useful bit of perspective.
The sun comes out from behind morning clouds and warms me. I remind myself to put my phone on the charger when I get back to camp, as I eye the trail heading back down the hill. I think about heading back, and take another look at the map. Time to begin again.
I slept in this morning, still waking quite early, but not early enough to catch the sunrise. I headed down the trail inhaling the sweet Spring-Summer air deeply; it smells of flowers, and vaguely of too-sweet breakfast cereal, which seems strange but not unpleasant.
The morning of a new day.
There are multitudes of goldfinches (or, perhaps, lesser goldfinches, I’m not certain) flitting about in the taller grass that separates the edge of the manicured park space from the vineyards adjacent to it. I try several times to photograph them, but they are much too quick for me.
What life reveals is often a matter of where we put our attention.
Since I can’t get a picture of the little birds this morning, I take pictures of the thistles blooming. I’m not disappointed or dissatisfied, each are interesting in their own ways. I listen to the little birds singing and chirping. The morning chill seeps through my sweater while I enjoy a moment at the side of the trail. It is my birthday, and this is how I am choosing to begin it, with the healthy practice of a bit of walking and self-reflection. It’s a lovely morning for it.
A moment well-spent.
I don’t know what today holds. I try to remember if I have “things to do” but my mind veers away from such practical matters in favor of birthday thoughts. Presents later. Cake too. Pizza for dinner maybe? Something different? I’m relatively easy to please, birthday-wise, more than anything else I just want the day to be mine, doing things I enjoy in the company I choose, and letting all of the hard work of life wait for another moment. 😁 The things it takes to delight me are not complicated and I still have an unspoiled childlike joy about birthdays.
I smile at the sunshine. I’m glad I took the day off from work. I hear a farm truck rattle past somewhere relatively close by. I already miss my Traveling Partner, and I’d really like a cup of coffee. lol I’m reluctant to disturb the little birds who have gathered around me in nearby grass and thistles, but there’s no coffee here and I’m beginning to feel chilly. I get to my feet and look down the trail. Seems like a good beginning for a new year. I wonder what 62 will be about? It’s definitely time to begin again.
Evening Light 