Friday, April 20, 2007

LIFE IS SO WEIRD...

Having shared my life with one person for twenty-five years or so, I tended to gravitate in her direction when I was pulled in two directions. Now that she is no longer around, I drift a lot more. She was the one who got me to commit to a church, which was not easy for me, though I was on a couple of counts more Catholic than the Pope, if not more Catholic than Cardinal Ratzinger.

No! WAIT! He is the Pope! How did that happen??? I want John XXIII back...

Anyway, she did most of the cooking, so I did most of the cleaning up. Now I have to cook again. Or would, if I didn't eat alone 99.99% of the time. One of the things that is most exciting to me about the idea of the Goat Man coming to visit is the thought of actually cooking for him. I noticed when he cooked, he took the easy [if tasty] way out and just broiled some steak.

Ah, steak... I'm not complaining, mind you.

But part of that parting is suddenly being confronted with yourself again: who are you without the other person to help define "you"? At the moment, I have no idea, though I have found out that I am capable of a number of things I had never seriously contemplated...

Who knew you could learn so much about yourself so late in life?

I have a deadline on Monday, and I am WAY behind. Like almost a month. I am going to be at work all weekend trying to get all the rabbits I can find in the hat out on the table, but at the moment the hat looks pretty rabbitless. Oh, dear God, let Monday be a nice, LONG day.

I figure if I can just a week's worth of work every day, I'll be OK. It would help if I were organized, which I'm not. I keep hoping that one of the magic medications I've been put on will suddenly make it possible for me to think straight and work without procrastination, but it ain't happened yet.

Oh, dear God, I am so tired of being ashamed of myself...

Here's a tidbit from Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who certainly knew what he was talking about:

It is infinitely easier to suffer in obedience to a human command than in the freedom of one's own responsibility. It is infinitely easier to suffer with others than to suffer alone. It is infinitely easier to suffer publicly and honorably than apart and ignominiously. It is infinitely easier to suffer through staking one's life than to suffer spiritually. Christ suffered as a free man alone, apart and in ignominy, in body and spirit; and since then many Christians have suffered with him.

Oh, it seems to be Hitler's 118th birthday: here's wishing him many happy returns to whatever circle of hell he sits in -- lots of fire and Zyklon B, I hope.
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