I may have hit my seasonal nadir. Hmmmm Feb. 23, 2021, a day after thinking day. Twenty years and a day, after I was diagnosed with breast cancer. How does one measure time? Certainly the highs and lows of the human experience come to mind. Do you..
1. Measure time, as a distance from birth - obviously your own, your siblings? your children? your parents, a favourite author, celebrity, friend?
2. Measure time, as relative to significant events - world wars, moon landings, pandemics, inventions and interventions.
3. Measure time, as data projections - the average life span for a woman is 82 years. My mother died at 83. My father died at 104 - defying all odds, but that in itself defined him.
4. Measure time as the objectives you have set for yourself and accomplished, or nor, as the case may be. I have set many goals for myself - travel, family, vocation, self-employment, creative pursuits. I'm probably 85% realized in this measure. Does one every reach 100%? It may be a reason to keep moving forward.
5. Measure time as your contribution to the human condition. How many lives have you saved, enriched, fostered?
6. Measure time as your contribution to nature. How many endangered species have you preserved; how much have you reduced, recycled, reused, repurposed......this in itself is a life's work.
7. Measure time as the constant change of the seasons, the neighbourhood, the government....this is something that is on-going - change is the only constant. How do we become a meaningful part of the "constant?"
8. Measure time as diary or log entries. Do you record what is meaningful or not in the day-to day rhythms of life?
9. Measure your life in daily challenges. I try to do as many as I can...or remember to do. However, over the past week or so, I have undertaken the painting of my daughter's room. She has flown the coop and I have been left with the "poop" - so to speak. To save some money and to rise to a challenge, I have patched, sanded, primed and am about to paint ceilings, walls and woodwork of an average sized bedroom. This is a therapy I would never have imagined I needed. Say naught that the challenge not availeth!!
In the grey of a February day, there is something about the white of a primer that clears the mind, covers the scars and leads the way to a new and peaceful place to be.
Oh and did I mention, I have new windows.....there is something about windows that lets in, not only the light, but the life on even the greyest of February days!!