Is there something you really want to do? You may not have told anyone or allowed yourself to dwell on it but is there something crouched inside you that you remember occasionally and your heart flip flops? It might be to live somewhere new, to start a business or a creative project, it may be an escape plan from a relationship or a job, it might be an entirely different life you really want or it might be finding the time to take that course in that skill you really want to have. Do you feel you are waiting for the right time to do it?
That's ok.
I have a lot of things I am waiting for; some are realistic, others are dreams. The time to devote to learning a water sport, the time to write more, the chance to move back to the coast, the opportunity to study again, the summer I will get to spend on Nantucket. These are all things I grew up just assuming I would get to do. Just because they were on my list. Recently, I got into a panic that I was so far from being the person this list paints the picture of. My journals and Pinterest account reflect this person but she is virtual - the real me is working hard to bring up a young family, working part time in education, keeping on top of laundry, weeding a small garden, making time for date nights, worrying that I'm doing all of this well enough.
Please don't misunderstand me, I am very grateful for my life. I am one of the luckiest people I know. I actually love weeding. My panic wasn't really about wanting a different life, mine was more of a realisation of how far I had drifted from the original plan. And that's ok too. But I then thought how important it is to check in with the 'stuff you really want to do' every so often. We watched a programme last night and the matriarch of a lovely family, having brought up her four children over fifty years, felt it was finally her time to do something for herself. She loved painting so she booked herself on a month long trip to Italy to paint. And it made me wonder about the balance of giving your all to the here and now - meeting the kids' needs and all that involves - and allowing yourself to chase those dreams. Does it have to be all one and then the other or can they co-exist?
Many articles that I read shout that today's women should absolutely chase their dreams. Girl power. We should find that magical way of being everything to our families but also book those weekends on yoga retreats or set up the easel once everyone is in bed and practise our watercolour. I have to be honest, I struggle with that! I am quite all or nothing so the thought of taking a break from potty training to spend a week learning to surf fills me with confusion. How can you do either of these well if you are part-timing it? I have no doubt some of you manage this and I applaud you (and am slightly intimidated by you). So I was left thinking will I rejoin the tracks of my dreams only once the responsibility to pay the mortgage/service the car/bake for the cake sale/clear out the shed/mediate the siblings/descale the kettle has died down?
But then I read a beautiful novel (where on earth would I be without that sentence?!). Nina George wrote The Little Paris Bookshop in German, Simon Pare translated it and my friend at the library recommended it to me. She said it was the story of a man who had a great start to life but then, when things went wrong, he hid himself away, wasting time, until life pulled him back in at the last minute. Having read it, I would recommend it but I wouldn't describe it like that. Jean Perdu runs a floating bookshop on the Seine. An early love affair blows his life wide but when it finishes, he devotes himself to his bookshop, recognising that, 'it was a common misconception that book sellers looked after books. They looked after people.'
Now I think Jean Perdu still had things he wanted to do but the time wasn't right. His bookshop became a waiting room of sorts BUT he was not wasting time. He knew that there would be another heart-bursting chapter in his life but he also knew the time leading up to that chapter was crucial. It wasn't glamorous or eventful but it was rich in soul food. When asked how he sold books, he says, "Books are like people, and people are like books. I'll tell you how I go about it. I ask myself: Is he or she the main character in his or her life? What is her motive?.. Is she in the process of editing herself out of her story, because her husband, her career, or her children or her job are consuming her entire text?..I compile courses of treatment. I prepare a medicine made of letters." " A book is both medic and medicine at once. It makes a diagnosis as well as offering therapy."
This man was waiting but he was fully living in the meantime. He was learning and reading and talking and listening and thinking and getting to know how people work. When his next adventure came, he was ready as a result. This made me see my panic in a whole new light. I know there are more adventures ahead but it's not their time. A mistake would be to see this time, the present, as a sign that I should adjust my future dreams. This time is preparing me for them. I'm not in a waiting room, I am in my own floating bookshop. Yes, for now we are moored but that means we can stock up on all the rich land experiences until it is time to sail again. And it's really ok to wait.
No comments:
Post a Comment