Sunday, August 05, 2007

Painting and the Art of Happiness

We took on a sum of white walls yesterday... the glowing morning light playing through the windows, music through the french doors and our brushes sticksticking with pastel paint. Blue tape borders and us between in our least favorite rags laying down paint on tiptoe and knee.

For past years i've been tied in thought, torn by the process of decision making, under the small weight of having little to go on. I've been happy yet uninspired, unmotivated, driven by nothing more than my personal want of feeling as such, making my own world and feigning any solid understanding of what exactly i'm doing in it. In part, due to some missteps but moreover simple advents of craziness that i wouldn't pin to any notion of fate or even coincidence. Some downright strange occurrences that i'd like to accept just as are.

It would be hard to claim any discontent, though there has been struggle. Somehow i've stayed up all along and still lingers a sense askance Would i have stayed on my feet much longer? Cos i found something and now with previous direction recoursed it's hard to compare anything, hard to remember what i was doing and to where i was going.

When i first met Cathleen and we were making a telephone plan to get together, i suggested some dumb logistical struggle that might impede our union... and she told me in a matter of words, that we are in control of most everything, and that's the bottom line. That thought really drew me, and i guess in retrospect how could it not? And yet there are times, many of them happy, when i stop and look around wondering, how can i possibly take credit for what my life holds? So many of these things have been beyond my ability and rather occurred of their own. And why would i assume my own control in things and, why would it matter if i weren't?

1 comment:

Eba said...

I'm constantly amazed by how, upon reflection, it seems we somehow manage to draw to ourselves precisely those experiences that we need to evolve, whether we know it or not and, more strikingly, whether we like it or not. They're not always pleasant, and perhaps too often gut-wrenchingly painful, but through some kind of magic wand we unconsciously carry, we seem to create a reality (or, if you prefer, attract an environment) that provides the ideal "custom-made" opportunity to learn, to grow, and- given enough attention and discipline- to flourish. May all your surroundings bring you love and happiness, Jeff-dog. Thanks for being there, and just for being yourself.