Month: June 2014

The not-deciding deciding

I’ve been thinking lately about the not-deciding that we do that is really deciding.  Do you know what I mean?  Those decisions that we put off, thinking we’ll know for sure sometime, and yet, somehow, we never do?  Eventually, over time, the not-deciding becomes, of course, a decision.

The obvious example is the have-another-child decision.  I wrote here about our decision not to have a third child, and it was, ultimately, something we decided.  But that was preceded by many years of “well, we’ll know if it’s time,” and }oh, not now, maybe someday,” and “yeah, we’ll discuss it later …” hemming and hawing.  And, over time, the delaying and not-deciding builds up, like so many imperceptible snowflakes, each tiny and dissolvable, into an immovable snow bank.  The decision is made and sometimes we’re not even aware of having made it.

The other way this has manifested in my personal life is in the not-deciding deciding to stay in our house.  For years we went back and forth on whether to move to a suburb and if so which one.  Many of our dearest friends live near each other.  I looked at several houses in that neighborhood.  I love that neighborhood.  But just, somehow, we didn’t.  We stayed put.  And now leaving feels inconceivable.  I’m not sure what the not-now-maybe-someday turned into not-ever.  But eventually, without my noticing, it did.

On some subconscious level we must be aware of the putting-off that amounts to a decision, right?  It feels easier to delay a formal decision even though we know, as we do that, that we are tacitly making one.  I am curious about this process, and when it is that our subconscious awareness of our bias seeps into our active mind, and when we realize that we have already decided something, even if we continue putting it off.

Have you made any any not-deciding decisions?  Were you aware of it as you did it?

Ziplining and online highs

This weekend was our annual visit to Conway to celebrate the end of the year.  I’ve got a post in my head that I want to write about the adaptability of traditions and the tension between ritual and new adventures.  So, I will save details for that.  But while I was gone, two great things happened.  Both, enormous thrills.  In fact you could say I can die now.

The first:

Blume

This was in response to a photograph of Grace reading Are You There Me, It’s Me Margaret? that I instagrammed (see below).

The second was when Rebecca Woolf, whose blog Girl’s Gone Child was one of the very first I read and who remains one of my all-time favorite writers here (and anywhere – her book, Rockabye: From Wild to Child, is marvelous) shared a post of mine.  I didn’t know she read my work so it was a huge thrill to realize she was aware of this piece, and her immensely generous words brought tears to my eyes.

The truth is the last few days in my real-life world haven’t been the easiest, so it was a timely, salient reminder this weekend that this online world can bring kindness, light, and connection.  I encourage you to visit and read Girl’s Gone Child if you don’t already.  Rebecca is downright wonderful.

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What could she teach him of loss?

Entering the Kingdom

As the boy’s bones lengthened,
and his head and heart enlarged,
his mother one day failed

to see herself in him.
He was a man then,
radiating the innate loneliness of men.

His expression was ever after
beyond her. When near sleep
his features eased towards childhood,

it was brief.
She could only squeeze
his broad shoulder. What could

she teach him
of loss, who now inflicted it
by entering the kingdom

of his own will?

– Mary Karr

Thank you to Katrina Kenison, on whose beautiful blog I first read this poem.

The Space Between

Dad’s abiding faith in the life of the rational mind is matched by his profound wonder at the power of the ineffable, the territory of religious belief, that which is beyond the intellect. I grew up in the space between these two seemingly opposite poles, and instinctively understood the ways in which their paradox could be understood as both opposite and utterly meshed.

Dad introduced me — never explicitly, but through the example of his passions — to the fact that something can be true and its opposite can also be true. Dad was the one who taught me about life’s ability to hold two poles in one hand. Even more, he taught me that often life insisted on that.

I’m delighted to share my first piece on Medium, The Space Between.  I’d love if you would click over to read but also to explore the site, which seems jammed with wonderful writing.  Thank you to Allison for teaching me about it.  I fell in love after I read this piece by Kelly Corrigan, which includes her trademark mix of humor and wisdom.

Commencement

Beginners G

closing ceremonies of Grace’s Beginner year, 2008

Whit-B

closing ceremonies of Whit’s Beginner year, 2010

I’m not sure if it’s because I live in a college town, or if it’s a relic of my many years in educational institutions myself, but there’s something essential in my soul that still beats on academic time.  I feel the end of something as profoundly at the end of the school year as I do at New Year’s.  This time of year, when people swarm my neighborhood in academic robes and caps and when I keep reading graduation speeches, I feel the grip of some inchoate sorrow that feels as incongruous as the world is bursting into riotous bloom around me as it is undeniable, unavoidable.

The truth is, right now, I feel sad.  Today is the end of something.  As I wrote last year, “no matter how many times I’m caught from the freefall of farewell by a new beginning, I still feel the loss.”  Today our children celebrate their closing ceremonies, Grace and Whit moving from fifth and third grade respectively.  There’s excitement – the summer lies ahead, with beaches and camps and later bedtimes and lots and lots of joy – but there’s an undeniable sorrow, too.  At least for me.  Something that will never be again is over.  I will never again sit in my car at the corner and watch my third and fifth grader walk through the school gates, big backpacks bobbing on their backs.  All year long, watching them go gives me a lump in my throat and a swell in my chest, but that feeling escalates as we near the end of the year.

I drive through Harvard Square and notice that they’ve begun erecting the tents for graduation, and this always reminds me of the sharp ache I used to feel when they started putting up fences and tents for reunions at Princeton.  The fences marked off each major reunion’s location, but they also delineated the end of another year.  Still, to this day, I remember the tears that used to spring to my eyes.  And the same tears came, unbidden, as I watched Harvard transforming itself to celebrate another commencement.  Today we do the same at Grace and Whit’s school.

I feel out of step with the celebration in the air today and this time of year, the overwhelming, enthusiastic rush towards summer I sense all around me.  Hold back!  Wait!  I say silently, wanting another day to dwell in this, here, now.  I’m always keenly aware of life’s accumulating farewells, but I think this time of year is when I feel them most acutely.  Kunitz’s feast of losses seep into my waking and my sleeping.  Today, I’ll blink back tears as I watch my 3rd and 5th grade days come to an end, as I marvel at this glittering life, turning so quickly I can barely keep up.

And so we go on, round and round and round in the circle game.  Captive on a carousel of time.  Another end and beginning twined together.  Life itself is a series of commencements, isn’t it?  Every day, we commence.

I’m caught from the freefall of farewell by a new beginning, though, I still feel the loss.  – See more at: https://adesignsovast.com/2013/05/commencement/#sthash.qEhpjhfz.dpuf
I’m caught from the freefall of farewell by a new beginning, though, I still feel the loss. – See more at: https://adesignsovast.com/2013/05/commencement/#sthash.qEhpjhfz.dpuf
I’m caught from the freefall of farewell by a new beginning, though, I still feel the loss.  – See more at: https://adesignsovast.com/2013/05/commencement/#sthash.qEhpjhfz.dpuf
I’m caught from the freefall of farewell by a new beginning, though, I still feel the loss.  – See more at: https://adesignsovast.com/2013/05/commencement/#sthash.qEhpjhfz.dpuf
I’m caught from the freefall of farewell by a new beginning, though, I still feel the loss.  – See more at: https://adesignsovast.com/2013/05/commencement/#sthash.qEhpjhfz.dpuf