Thursday, December 6, 2012

Meditation



I was going to muse about clutter today, the literal stuff that sits in piles on the dining room table, takes its shape in unread books by the side of the bed, a pair of cuffed gray pants that need to be shortened, hanging over the chair in my bedroom, a small wooden one with a fabric seat that I bought in Millerton, New York that does nothing but hold wraps, a shoulder bag that I knit out of the fattest purple yarn, yarn in linen bags, bags that came free with the other stuff in the order. I was going to write about pushing clutter back, the clutter in the house, the clutter in the mind so you don't end up like the frail, elderly English people sitting with greasy strands of white hair sitting on metal folding chairs outside their home last Saturday afternoon as people riffled through their house -- thousands of books! -- the notice said, but plaster was falling from the ceiling, the books were piled to the ceiling, garbage overflowed cans, the proverbial cans of cat food, open on the counter, dried food in the pans on the stove, a pair of underwear lying in the hallway, a hand-written sign on a door that said Don't come in, person sleeping, and the smell, the smell of too many things. I was going to muse about the panic of clutter, things standing for thoughts, the mind a room that needs to be cleaned up, not gone through, not so much riffled but blown up, blown away.

7 comments:

  1. you're a woman who works hard at other, more important things

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  2. I think you should write about clutter soon.
    Haha!
    No, seriously. That was beautiful and why do we all have these areas of clutter and it's just a degree of difference between friendly clutter and that quick, downhill slide to the cat food on the counter and please, god, don't ever let me get there.
    Now my mind is a different matter and it's already got cat food on the counter.

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  3. I took 5 lbs. of New Yorkers to the senior center yesterday. Today, before I take my mom to the dentist, I think I'll walk to the beach and look for some stones and shells to clutter my patio.

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  4. I am working on something about memory and mind-clutter and how and why our brains choose certain things over others to hold onto or make readily available. That part of my own inner life confuses and amazes me and you've just stirred it up a bit more.

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  5. Christmas always brings about thoughts of clutter. So much stuff coming in, going out, buying, wrapping, etc. I'm in the process of loading up a bag for charity right now!

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  6. love all the imagery in this piece. i love how you seem to throw something together that is so common place and elevate into beauty and meaning.

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  7. My mind is so quiet this year, and I know it's because I can't do one lick of shopping until the infamous bonus-that-might-be-just-a-turkey arrives. It's a wonderful relief. Also I did Deepak Chopra's abundance meditations, so he gets a bit of credit. Lately I find I want, more than anything, more than friendships, quiet and peace. For now, we'll both be monks here among the full catastrophe.

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