Walk

On Saturday morning, still housesitting for my parents, I decided to drag myself out of bed and go for a walk. I just didn’t feel like sitting inside, reading the newspaper, letting the day go by. So at around 9:45 I threw on some clothes and went out for what I intended to be a 20-minute walk or so. Instead, I was out for about two hours, and I had a wonderful, wonderful time. When I can get myself out of bed and outside early in the morning — which is rare — I’m usually glad I’ve done it.

It was a gray morning, and I just picked a direction and started walking. I walked up, down, and around my town, the town where I grew up, walked along winding meandering streets with hardly any cars in sight, past suburban houses of all shapes, styles and sizes, getting lost among it all. I walked past the houses of three childhood friends, all of whose families moved away long ago. I walked past the house of my childhood piano teacher, who spent three years trying unsuccessfully to get me to practice regularly. I let my mind fill with memories and thoughts and ideas. I thought about anything and everything — my childhood, my dad, my mom. I walked past one house that had big double doors and it made me think of Frank Lloyd Wright, Batman, the Life boardgame, and 1930’s Hollywood. I came upon a park with a duck pond and sat on a bench for about 15 minutes — just sat there, Zen-like, staring at the ducks, thinking of Holden Caulfield. At that moment I was at peace. It didn’t matter what year it was; civilization did not exist. I’ve long had a dream that everyone in the world would disappear, and I’d be free to go in and out of their houses at will, undisturbed, sleep in their beds, root through their porn collections, eat their food, curl up on their couches.

Eventually I walked back to the busier section of town, stopped by CVS to buy a new spiral notebook to continue my journal, picked up a delicious tuna salad sandwich for lunch at a local sandwich shop. By the time I got back to the house, where there was nobody but a tired, loyal dog waiting for me, I felt like I’d traversed the universe. Worlds had come and gone, and I had a tuna sandwich to look forward to for lunch.

All this, and it wasn’t yet noon on a Saturday. I love days like that.

I have a dream, and walking around town helped reinforce it. I want to be a middle-aged person with my own little house where I can cocoon myself whenever I want, where I can go days without seeing a single human being if I don’t feel like it, where I can read and write and listen to classical music. I want to work in a library, filled with books and ideas and the entirety of human knowledge.

These are such simple dreams, and I’m sure I can achieve them. But in reality, I wonder how satisfied I’d feel. Because I also want a great little apartment in Manhattan, and I want to have Exciting Times, and achieve Great Things. I’m only 27, far from middle-aged, and there are some other things I want to get out of my system first, because if I reach the simpler goals, well, then what?

I’m afraid that if I achieve them, I still won’t be satisfied, and I’ll have to find yet more goals.

I hate making choices, because that closes off other choices.

But so what? I should go for my goals anyway, no matter how small.

There’s an abundant universe out there.

To Inspire

(I just wrote the following in an e-mail to a friend, and I thought I’d post it here. For me and maybe for others.)

I felt fine after I saved the dog last night; but then later at night, and this morning, I was panicking again.

It’s such a mental thing. But there are certain things you can do to feel better.

Be good to yourself. Get enough sleep, eat right, get exercise, get the blood flowing. Think of other things. Read. Do you what you need to do to calm and relax yourself, because that is more important than almost anything else in life. It’s why we live in the first place.

Be kind of Zen about everything. Go for a walk and become aware of details. The way a certain tree trunk twists. The exact shade of blue in the sky. A bird. This actually does help.

Live in the now. Of course be careful, take all the precautions you can, but that’s not what I’m talking about. What I mean by “live in the now” is, be okay this very moment. If you can be okay this very moment, be okay for the next moment. And the next. And so on. Life is a string of present moments. Worrying involves the future, and most of the things we worry about never come to pass.

Waking up every day and getting out of bed, making it back into your bed at night — these are accomplishments.

Notice every little good thing that happens during the day, no matter how insignificant. Something that makes you smile. A good meal. A good thought. Anything. Why? Because it tells you that no matter what kind of crap is going on in your life, it is always, *always* possible to find great moments each day. Live in anticipation of those moments. It gives you something to hope for.

Most of the things we worry about never come to pass.