Thursday, March 15, 2018
I woke up finally for good this morning at 6:30 AM after another disrupted night. I was tired enough last night after an active day to turn off the light early, around 8:30 PM, but then I woke up at 12:30 AM knowing there was no way I was going to get back to sleep so I ended up re-reading a short story by Raymond Carver in preparation for a discussion of it next week, turning off the light again at 1:30 AM. The intervening five hours were restless with a recurring dream – and I normally don’t dream or, if I do, I can’t remember them – about parts of a solid wood airplane model I kept for kids to play with and glue together on a big flat, low table when they and their parents came to eat at my restaurant. What I recall being impressed with is that one of those kids grew up to become a successful pilot which to my mind was directly linked to his early days playing with the model airplane at the low table in my restaurant and how happy that made me. So what’s my subconscious state telling me? I have no idea unless it has something to do with my fundamental desire to be useful in my old age. It is a surprisingly strong feeling, I discover, as I let it emerge now within me. And, I surmise, it’s something we all experience. We want our lives, finally, to be deemed worthy lives, lives that have helped, in some way, to bring about change for the better. Can I make that generalization? Maybe not. I do know, however, that it applies to me. I want my life to amount to something. And that translates directly into sharing the depth of love and joy I discover in me as I make my way in what Richard Rohr, the Franciscan scholar, refers to as the second half of my journey.
