A long, relatively good day today. (That is not a complete sentence, I know.) I think I haven’t been sleeping very well, so I am actually quite sleepy. I have an early day tomorrow morning, though, so as tempting as it might be to stay up late and watch an interesting show on television that comes on at 10, I think I’ll pass tonight.
This is one of those evenings when I stare at the computer screen willing myself to begin typing, hoping that I have something that I want to say. The truth is, I am nearly at the end of what has been an emotionally draining week. The weekend is already loaded with activities, beginning with a meeting of sorts tomorrow and next week, the outcome of which will help determine the what’s next for my son, and might help me along with figuring out my what’s next. On Saturday morning, my daughter graduates from college. Her father and I will go watch her cross the stage and then we’ll celebrate her and her accomplishments. She will be home for part of the summer before heading off to her what’s next–graduate school in Seattle. I plan to help her load up her car and drive her up there then fly back to wherever my what’s next is. And then Sunday is Mother’s Day, which I fully expect to be a low-key, uneventful, typical Sunday. I will no doubt write about these events as they unfold. All are significant and each will have elements of gratitude woven throughout, so I imagine I’ll have no shortage of things to write about.
Tonight I am simply grateful for the ability to draw a deep breath, allowing the oxygen to flow through my temporarily able body. Grateful that my fingers can move freely and without pain across the keyboard, that my hands and arms move the way I want them to, and that I can feel the weight and the heat of my laptop as it rests on my lap. I am grateful for a mind that, for the most part, is clear and capable of coherent thought, of communication, of creativity. I can hear the whirring of the fan sending the cool air tickling across my body as I sit here. “I am wonderfully and fearfully made,” the writer says, which to me speaks to this amazing and complex collection of cells called the human body. I am grateful for each part working, for the most part, how it’s supposed to work. I do not take this for granted. I also note the things that perhaps don’t work as well as they used to, or don’t look as neat and trime as they once did. This is the temporary part of “temporarily able bodied.” And that’s alright, it is as it should be. I am grateful.
I am going to go write my haiku now. I am writing a haiku a day for the month of May. Most of them probably aren’t that good–I am not sure I am following the proper form, rules of gramar and syllables, etc. But it is a simple thing to do. I committed to doing it and do it I will. These are small things that keep me anchored in the present moment–my morning journal, my daily haiku, my evening blog. Unplanned and unrehearsed, they are small tokens of self expression. There is no acclaim save the occasional comment, no notoriety gained from these writings. They are for me and they are not for me. And it’s all good.
What are you grateful for this evening, and how do you express it?
