Been ruminating of late on the ordinariness of most days — every day, really. The quotidian, the expected, and the realization of expectations. You put four quarters in the slot and — klunk — down rolls the can of pop. (I think maybe I'm dating myself here on my recalled version of a vending machine, but whatever.)
Within that ordinary lies comfort and ease, as well as boredom and disappointment. Was this what I signed up for?
How many of us go about our to-and-fro trudge to the factory, eat dinner, view a screen, go to bed — the seemingly endless repetition that makes up our routine? Then there's the distraction of a movie on the weekend, a meal someplace other than the kitchen table. A pause in the order of things, a repositioning, only to start it all up again when the week commences. It goes and it goes.
And then there's the unexpected rut in the road, one wheel stuck and grinding the mud.
I found out today that a man I know has end-stage liver failure. Weeks left of his ordinariness, months if he's lucky. A man with an astonishment of talent and perception whose path forward stumbled and collapsed, an abandonment of possibilities. I'm struggling with both grief and anger — anger at the insidiousness of mental illness and alcoholism. Despair as I witness the abbreviation of yet another life.
I'll take the ordinary.
Yes ma'am.
Serve it up for breakfast, I'm hungry.
A few months back I had a period of feeling like a useless automaton. Luckily it passed and I soon returned to my usual useless automaton self.
ReplyDeleteWell said. It always comes too fast, it seems.
ReplyDeletesomeone's impending death has a way of putting your own into perspective. life is indeed quite ordinary, most of the time. when i'm least expecting it, something marvelous happens and I find myself humming a tune.
ReplyDeleteI love your writing about the ho-hum of it all. There are marvelous things in the details, and I think that writing about it (if you are the creative sort that you are) can elevate to something else.
The joy of being a poet is seeing the magic in everyday things and routines and you certainly have the ability to do that.
ReplyDeleteThe grief and anger are normal. Every time I hear about liver failure, I become angry and sad. My son, JayJ died of alcoholism. His liver was the first organ to shut down. It's been almost two years and I'm still questioning, and over thinking. Your in my thoughts! G
ReplyDelete