There's Calm In Your Eye

Originally posted on 8/30/11


Hurricane Irene came and went with little effect to those of us in the EV of NYC. We're far luckier than the people in New Jersey and other places up the East Coast. The worst of it for us was two days of cabin fever. When Monday came, the subway system was still coming back online so many folks were unable to get to work. With the sun out, the cooped-up masses hit the street. Thanks to modern technology I could do most of my work via smartphone when I wasn't glomming wireless internet from the diner on the corner.

As there wasn't much happening on the work front I decided to hit the promenade by the East River on my skateboard. At one point I decided to sit on a bench and stare at Williamsburg directly across from me. Sitting there, I realized that I just don't have the time to do the things I really want to do. On Sunday as the wind was rattling the trees outside, we finally organized the front closet and rewarded ourselves by addressing the “Homicide: Life On The Streets” logjam in our DVR. We haven't spent a ton of time together recently so it was great to lie down and not worry about getting up for work or the next task to schlep to. The two of us (and the dog) could be together and present without the sense of an impeding stop time. After getting re-acquainted with “Degrassi: The Next Generation” via the web, I grabbed my beat-to-hell acoustic guitar, plugged in the USB mic that I've not been able to use, and recorded some music for the first time in months. Most gratifying.

While I was enjoying myself on that bench in the park, it dawned on me that the storm rid me of lots of outside distractions and allowed me to focus on things that were fulfilling to me: reducing clutter; hanging with the girl and dog; making music. Since there was nothing happening on the work front, I was able to let go of work tension because there was nothing I was going to be able to change with no one around. Sitting in front of the monitor right now as I compose my thoughts after a day at the office, I feel how tired I am. It took a little bit of pushing to get myself to put this together whereas the other day I spontaneously picked up the guitar and, after learning how to play Nirvana's “Heart Shaped Box” via YouTube, put down a track.

My life has gotten pretty busy these days and most of that time is spent on pursuits that are not meaningful to me other than the means to a paycheck. Lately, I've felt like my life is slipping away from me as I put on my worker-guy uniform and march in line like the rest of the masses. It's a prison of sorts and the choices consist of either sucking it up and accepting that this is my life or rejecting it altogether. Sitting in the middle where I know I'm unhappy without the resolution to rest firmly on either side of the fence probably feels worse than living in either extreme. It is becoming increasingly difficult to find those pockets of time to devote to the pursuit of my passions. I read a blog post recently where the author said that if you're not able to devote 5 hours a day to something you want to do, it's not that important to you. I wonder how that author is able to find his 5 hours. If I do a quick inventory, I work 9 or so hours a day, take about 90 minutes to get to and from work, try to sleep 8 hours a day and spend 30 minutes getting ready in the morning. My math tells me that I have 5 hours left. With that 5 hours, I would like to cram in exercise (30 minutes at least) and eating (total of 1 hour or so). If I want to spend an hour a day with my partner, that leaves me with 2 ½ hours to myself. Take 30 minutes for reading a book and 15 minutes to get ready for bed there's now 1:45 left. Not to sound like a cop-out but that's not a lot of time. The name of the game that I've been trying to win is called Balance. It simply does not exist in my life. I'm not saying I have it hard or that I have good excuses. I'm just saying what I'm saying.

When circumstances forced me to sit still this weekend, I found myself with energy and focus. Obviously, I still have to work for a living but when circumstances forced me to sit still I found that I had energy and focus. It was as if for a fleeting moment, Hurricane Irene came in and briefly swept away much of the junk in my life that separates me from my freer self. One other thing that dawned on me was that the world did not come to an end yesterday because I was not in the office working. All of the work was there waiting for me and my life did not suffer greatly due to the lost day of productivity. It goes to show you that perhaps some of those work urgencies really aren't as important as they seem in the moment.

Perhaps that's the lesson for me.

Image courtesy of cnn.com