"This is Lovely"

Today was really one of my least favorite days I've had in a while. Prior to about 5:00, I would have told you that I was becoming a cave woman and moving to Madagascar, where I didn't have to bother with interacting with anybody but me, myself and I. This option seems very appealing to me on days like today, where I am forced to contend with work drama, relational issues, miscommunications, issues to be resolved, embarrassment in front of a group of people, emotional rollercoasters, and a general feeling of inadequacy and disappointment. Sounds like a lot - and it is. The fact that I process things emotionally also wasn't helped by my extremely full schedule. I went from one meeting to another to another, and over the day, things built up to a very, very dangerous level (hence the Madagascar talk). It is on days like these that I really get down. I get in a funk, and I can't seem to see the silver lining in any situation, get easily frustrated, feel inadequate, and generally need a good sleep to reset myself and start over again.

Today was no exception. I came home from work, ate a couple of leftover potstickers, and immediately headed to my other job, nannying. This job is really hit or miss as far as the kids go. Some days, they're perfect, fun, and mind me. On other days, they are crazy, restless, stubborn, and that's just the beginning. As I walked the brief distance to their house, I began pondering what kind of day I was about to have. My mind immediately led me to the worst assumption, and I entered the house ready for a battle. What happened next didn't disappoint. The boy, age 7, was throwing a gargantuan fit about not doing his 15 minutes of required reading. It was suggested that he could read to me out loud to satisfy this portion of the homework. I begrudgingly agreed, and we sat down on the couch together as he read. Every thirty seconds he asked how much longer he had, but as I listened to his adorable lisp-accented, second grade pronunciations (correcting only so often) something changed. I saw him smile as he read through the funny parts of the book, and watched as he reveled in his correct pronunciation of the word 'exceptionally'. I suddenly wasn't thinking about my horrible day, but was enjoying time with him.

Later on, after he and his grandmother went to boy scouts, I took his sweet sister to the park. As we walked, hand-in-hand, I began to see the world as she did. She pointed out cars that look like her mommy's car, told me that we needed to look both ways before we crossed the street, and spun in excited, 5 year old circles once we finally got to the park. She and I went on the swings, played on the playground, but eventually laid down on the rubberized bridge suspended between two parts of the play structure. As we laid there, pointing out things we saw, and learning the colors in Spanish, she said something that I thought was remarkable. She reached over, grabbed my hand, and said simply, "This is Lovely". I looked at her, and saw smiles ear to ear and a glint in her eye. It was at this moment that I realized... kids are profound. I mean, I have been aware of this before, but I often lose sight of it or simplify it due to my adult self-importance. What I re-learned in the moment is that those moments are precious-she has no worries at all. Nevermind that her mother abandoned she and her brother when they were younger, only visiting occasionally, nevermind that she is being raised by (fabulous) grandparents who can't physically do everything they wish they could, nevermind that she has seen more in her short lifetime than many adults have encountered in theirs. At that moment, the azul sky, cool breeze in her hair, and the moment to relax were enough for her, and they were for me, too.

Taking time to hear the music

Do you ever have days where you feel like life, or God or whatever you believe in is trying to tell you something? I had lunch today with a sweet friend, one who I like more and more every time we spend together. She and I got into a discussion about patience, and that led us into a conversation about appreciating the now - for truthfully, it is really all we have. As much as both she and I are forward-looking, planned out people, we identified that these traits sometimes create dissatisfaction in our lives. Now, I'm not suggesting that we should entirely block out the idea of the future, or that we should only focus on this very moment at all. What I would argue, however, is that we place so little emphasis on the NOW. We spend months planning vacations, and once we get there, all we can think about is the next thing. Where will we go next? What is waiting at home? What kind of work will I have to make up once I return? This kind of flawed thinking breeds discontentment. No matter how great, how sweet, how perfect a moment is, we as people fundamentally look for the next best thing. Perhaps this is our way of dealing with an uncertain present. It is certainly easier to imagine a future in our minds, one that we seemingly have unlimited control over - why else would we escape the living, breathing moments right in front of us?

I saw a post on somebody's facebook today, and finding myself with a few extra minutes to spare, I decided to check it out. It is an experiment done by the Washington Post that centers in a way around this exact question. What they did was approach one of the greatest violinists of our time, one who plays a 3.5 million dollar Stradivarius violin, (incidentally enough considered one of the most perfect violins ever crafted), and ask him to take part in a social experiment. They placed this guy in the entrance of a DC metro station. Dressed simply and with an open violin case, he played some of the most technically challenging and beautiful violin pieces ever written- and the newspaper placed a hidden camera to see what people would do. Although the music was beautiful (they included samples) hardly ANYBODY stopped and listened. The paper was clever enough to stop people after they walked out of sight and ask them why they didn't stop, and the majority of people said that they were either a) too busy, or b) didn't even notice. They didn't EVEN NOTICE! Maybe I'm biased because I'm a music appreciator, but I found this appalling.

Hold on a second, Whitney. I began to reminisce back to experiences that I have had in the past with street musicians, and I find in myself, gasp!, a hypocrite. I remember really vividly being in London and Paris this past year, and walking past countless street musicians with not an appreciation of their (sometimes present) musical prowess, but rather a suspicion that I was about to be mugged, by a weapon cleverly disguised as a guitar or ukelele. I even remember being back in London in March for my second go-round and seeing that the city had cleverly placed half-circle 4 foot in diameter stickers in strategically placed locations in the underground with the explanation that these half-circles were indeed occupied by legitimate street musicians who had registered with the transportation authority. A digression... only in London would one find such ultra-organization for such a seemingly insignificant issue. Even then, with these circles designated for musicianship, never did I pause to appreciate what i was hearing. In all of my times passing street musicians, and even the times that the musicians came to me (an accordion player plunking out La Vie En Rose on a Parisian metro train comes to mind), I never appreciated them. I think this was most often out of fear, or busyness. I was simply too scared or too self-involved to take time to marvel at their music.

I think that this is such a great metaphor for life and how we devalue the things that truthfully, probably bring us the most pleasure, and how we overvalue intangibles that we may never attain. The next time I pass a street musician (assuming they're good!), see an amazing sunset, cast my eyes past a beautiful starscape, or walk past a garden, I promise myself to pause and enjoy the moment. I can worry about the meeting with a parent of a Junior High student and how I might get fired for letting kids smack each other with pool noodles, I can think about tomorrow, and all of the excitements, challenges and issues that will be brought, I can even think about where I'll be in ten or fifteen years. But in the end, I promise myself that I will take time to appreciate the now, because it really is all anybody has.