It would make more sense to me to begin a new year with a solstice or an equinox. Even a full moon would have been nice this year.
And with that sentence: my first resolution of the year is to stop fantasizing that things could be different from what they are in any given moment. I find myself using a bizarre amount of energy on things that aren’t even important to me. An odd kind of diversion and procrastination – that is also a practice in dissatisfaction. I have no need to practice this. I’m already much better at it than I want to be.
It’s not likely I will change the things I can change if my focus is on irrelevant details. When I choose to begin again is irrelevant. I just need to choose. To live consciously.
Camus said it is our human condition, and what is worthwhile. Imagine Sisyphus happy knowing there is no winning. Imagine Sisyphus content.
Hell, even choosing not to choose is living consciously when you acknowledge what you’re doing. I figure, even if it is all one big illusion, it’s the illusion that makes us human.
On our annual January 1st beach run, E. and I watched the sunset, red sinking into the sea. It was a promise of at least a day or two of clear skies, and it has been clear. And cold. Yesterday the edges of the lake were frozen, and this morning, walking Leonard at 4 am, I loved the way each step across the grass was cushioned. The ice-covered blades giving in slowly. Letting me down easy – which seemed considerate considering the early hour.
Leonard must have eaten something he shouldn’t have yesterday. He’s resting now on the sofa with a stomach full of chicken and rice. I hear E. using the coffee grinder in the kitchen. And here I sit with my fingers on the keyboard whose M,N,L, S and V keys are completely without lettering.
This morning I am grateful my mother made me take touch-typing in high school: “data entry” they called it by then. She made me believe I had no choice in the matter.
Dinner is cooking, work looms, body parts ache, I’m a little sleep-deprived, and no doubt Leonard with scramble off the couch any minute, in a whining rush for the door.
And all is right with the world.
There’s time for poetry.
Everywhere joy in relation and nowhere grasping;
world in abundance and earth enough.
Rainer Maria Rilke (trans. Joanna Macy & Anita Borrows)
from “I Lift My Eyes”
Ren Powell, Poet | Playwright | Teaching Artist 
4 responses to “Arbitrary Beginnings”
My N key is naked.
Tomorrow, I begin a new volunteer hosting of a gathering of writers on zoom. We will “co-work” – lending each other the support of company and focus as we each work on …. whatever we wish.
This weekly gathering is my offering to the members of The Writers’ Union of Canada.
I am excited.
And nervous.
New people.
New thing.
The adventure continues.
go easy ~p
How exciting! I hope this year brings so much creative satisfaction for you!
happy new year, ren!
And to you!