A Growing Serenity

I’ve noticed/realized that I’ve written precious little, lately.
I apologize to you, Dear Reader, for the clicks wasted to visit here, only to find nothing new or noteworthy.

Silence happens.

There have been other times when I’ve been relatively quiet. Over the past two years there have been months when I’ve found few words. Heretofore, it had always been a matter of too many questions and precious few answers.

It’s different this time.

I’ve lapsed into a serenity of sorts. Oh, sure, my head is still a ramshackle jumble, a cacophonous carousel. It always is. If my mind were ever to grow quiet and serene, I would surely die of terror. There’s always a riot going on upstairs.

I try to shelter you from my perennial ponderings about political prevaricators, the irreligious religious, humanity’s inhumanity, the Tao of bowling, the metaphysical mysteries of soup, the significance of shoelaces, and all the flotsam and jetsam ever present within this insomniac’s skull. I am a merciful man.

I’ve tried to answer my most pressing questions, define my deepest ponderings and truths. I have grieved the loss of three of my most important relationships. All had ended in the death of either someone or something most precious, rare and beautiful. I have grieved mightily. I’ve stumbled and crawled through all the stages of grief (even adding a few of my own). There was denial, anger, resentment, bargaining, guilt, numbness, depression, disorganization and despair aplenty. These emotions, these hurts, were my grist for words as I groped for acceptance, hope and understanding.

I’ve grown silent.

All the questions that could be answered have been answered. Those that have no answers have been buried or abandoned by the wayside. I can’t undo my doings. I can’t “un-choose” the choices I, and others, have chosen. Life’s road is, after all, a one-way street. I can look back (and often do), but time will slowly obliterate my footsteps, brambles will overgrow my traces, and fog will descend upon the road once traveled. I can look back through the mist, but know I can’t go back.

The way calls forward to the future.

Life and Love cry out to me, again. I’ve been lashed to the mast for too long. I yearn to submit to the Sirens’ Song. Granted, my steps are still tentative. I’ve yet to find the legs to dance. Still, I am on my way. My growing serenity tells me that it is time I must.

As Winter bows before the grandeur of Spring, I turn my face to the warming sun and the cleansing rain. Music has made a return, of sorts. Quiet songs of love and hope fill my ears again. I look to the future a chastened man, a humbled man. I look to the future with open eyes and an open heart. It’s not for me to know if I will prosper or perish and, frankly, it makes little difference (although I do have a decided preference for one versus the other). Whatever waits beyond the horizon will be my fate, my destiny.

I shall embrace it all with a growing sense of serenity.

* * *

(to be continued...)