I’m lost, but I’m not stranded yet

Egaré en chemin
Tu verras le pire

Pour trouver le sud
Sans perdre le Nord
Après les certitudes
Au-delà des bords

I’m lost but I’m not stranded yet

-–Noir Désir

 

Being lost is scary for a lot of people.
I’ve always sort of enjoyed it.
When  I lived in Paris, I used to go out and try to get  a little lost wandering around the city. On purpose. Get on a bus at random. Get off somewhere that looks interesting. Roam around. Get on another bus. Repeat as necessary. It was a way to learn the city and entertain myself on a very limited budget, and since Paris has such great public transportation there was really no way to get too lost.
It’s how I ended up having mint tea with a group of North Africans while they helped me figure out the best way for me to get home.
Which is also  how I found out how much I assume about others by how they dress.
It’s how I ended up finding a shoe store with prices even I could afford on the weird looking stuff I loved.
It’s how I found the only place in Paris to buy tortillas and refried beans, and a great deli.
It’s how I found out that being uncomfortable can sometimes be not only good for you but also a lot of fun.
This doesn’t apply to getting lost when you need to be somewhere at a specific time.
Like, say, a job interview.
Even then, I got lucky.
One time, a cute Italian guy took pity on me and gave me a ride to my appointment  in his Ferrari.
In retrospect, he may have thought he was the one who was going to get lucky…

 

What’s the most important thing you never said?

It’s the damage that we do and never know. It’s the words that we don’t say that scare me so.
–Elvis Costello

 

We are masters of the unsaid words, but slaves of those we let slip out.

–Winston Churchill

 

From the time we are toddlers and learn the power of NO, most of us have a pretty good understanding of the power of words. Over time we also learn that has been said cannot really be taken back. The words cannot be unsaid once they are out there. It takes us a lot longer to figure out that the opposite is also true.

 

What what we don’t say can’t ever be heard.

It can only be…guessed at…imagined…dreamed of…ignored… unknown.

If you don’t say something, are you really in control of it as Churchill said, or does it control you?

 

What would happen if you did say it?

What would happen if you didn’t ever say it?

 

Would you rather regret something that happens because of what you said,

or something that happens because you don’t say anything?

Or something that doesn’t happen because you don’t say anything?

 

Maybe you wouldn’t regret it.

Maybe it would change something in a small way.

Maybe it would change everything.

For better?

For worse?

 

You don’t ever get to find out.

Unless you say it.

 

What’s the most important thing I never said?

It’s something I didn’t write to someone.

It’s in the distant past, I’m not beating myself up about it now, but I recognize that it was a mistake, possibly a big mistake.

Not (only) because of the eventual outcome,  but because  the only reason I didn’t respond was  because I was afraid of being hurt.

With the scant amount of wisdom I’ve gained in the years since then, I realize that being afraid of being hurt is one of the worst reasons not to say or do something.  Someday, maybe I’ll be wise enough to use  words when words are called for.

 

Words are powerful.

Even ones that never get said.

 

I’ll keep practicing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Are You Bored?

“I am selfish, private and easily bored. Will this be a problem?”
―Neil Gaiman, A Study in Emerald

 

I’m seldom bored. I have the opposite problem, if you can call it that: I’m appallingly easily entertained. I laugh at the most random things. When I’m not laughing, I’m smiling. I read books. I wander around the house singing. I knit hats. I write a bunch of things that no one ever sees and a few things that a few people see. I watch old movies and cry. I walk around and look at the trees and the sky. I think about things. I don’t think about things. On the few occasions when I find myself calling myself bored, it’s usually something else I’m unhappy about when I think about what is going on.

 

It’s a small life, which some people might find dull, but it doesn’t bore me.

Does it matter that other people might find it boring?

Nope.

 

 

Should I try to have a larger life? Am I somehow betraying the gift of Life by living small?

That is a question I do not know the answer to.

 

To address the rest of the quote: yes, I am a bit selfish. More than a bit, probably.

 

I’d say I’m also very private, but it seems silly to write that on the Internet where anyone in the World could see it.

(It’s true, though.)