life is more than a dress rehearsal

opening a door: routine =life

There are so many things that we are supposed to do on a daily basis that doing them all (as recommended by your doctor, friends, family, magazine, and pop culture icons) would take a millennium at least.  So, I have long avoided adding anything to my routine…which I have recently discovered is, in fact, my life.

Because of this avoidance, I do not write as much as I want.  Or read.  Or dance.  Or stretch. Or play with my parakeet.

So, I am adding writing to my nightly routine—and maybe it will be worth the longer “to-do” list.  Because, after all, what is a “to-do” list but your plan for making life happen?  It becomes a burden when we put other people’s lives on it.  Other people’s expectations of our activity that end up causing us to live their lives instead of ours.  I am putting writing on my list because I want to write.  I am not putting eating vegetables on my list because my doctor, not me, wants me to eat more vegetables.

I want to talk.  I want to write.  I want to say things and create meaning because therein is the significance and the delight (and the toil) of life.  Could I keep quiet and find reward in doing my hourly job well? Having clean laundry and a straight room and ice cream for dessert? And be happy? Yes.  Most certainly.

But I also kind of want something more.  Not because my life is insufficient, but because I realize that I am living life intentionally or not and I would rather choose what I am doing, put some desire into it, than simply fulfill expectations on behalf of other people.  So, tonight, I will be getting fifteen minutes less sleep because I wrote this rambling blog.  But eventually, those fifteen minutes each evening might accumulate into fifteen Original Thoughts that coalesce meaning and significance out of my daily routine–or perhaps simply lend expression to the significance already there but imperceptible apart from a fifteen minute staring contest.