How long does it take you to get ready for bed? It takes me at least 1/2 hour. At a minimum I: straighten the living room, tidy the kitchen, set up the coffee pot, take the dogs out, put them to bed, wash my face, brush my teeth, get a glass of water, turn off the lights, check the locks, turn off the heat, THEN go upstairs, straighten the bed, gather my reading material and glasses, open the window, get undressed, and then, finally, get into bed.
Last night I realized, mid-routine, that I was irritated by this process. All the stuff I had to do was just a series of obstacles between what I'd been doing, and what I was going to do next. This part, the process, was somehow unworthy of appreciation, or even notice, except as an aggravation. Strange, if you think about it (and I did, of course). Wasteful, really, to be irritated by 1/2 hour of every single day of my precious life. That's 182.5 hours a year. 7.6 days a year. Year after year after year. I spend an entire WEEK every year being pissed off about my bedtime routine. At the end of this ride I bet I'll wish I'd spent those weeks differently. Hell, I'm already wishing that!
"The lesson which
life repeats and constantly enforces is 'look
under foot.' You are always nearer
to the divine and the true sources of your power than you think. The lure of
the distant and the difficult is deceptive.
The great
opportunity is where you are.
Do not despise your
own place and hour. Every place is under the stars, every place is the center
of the world. Stand in your own dooryard and you have eight thousand miles of
solid ground beneath you, and all the sidereal splendors overhead." - John
Burroughs
