Entropy

as my life changes before my very eyes, evolves, grows, softens, i feel as though i can’t let it.  i have to hold on with all my might… i have to suppress feelings, emotions, life until i have “time” to feel them, to understand them.  is it right to ask someone to put parts of their life on hold?  my life is wonderful… i have a family here in this space… my bean.. he is always mine, he lives in my soul, mind and heart.  why couldn’t you have waited?  [i hear this in memory] this sounds expensive [a voice i know well].

is there a perfect time and place and financial situation for everything that life throws at us?  i was recently looking on the bbc new website and an artist did a piece on the faces of death.  a photo of a person taken just a few months before they passed away, and then another one after their spirit had left them… it also had a bit of their story next to the photo.  one woman who died in her 70s said that she was diagnosed with cancer in her 60s right after she retired.  in the piece she stated something to the effect of ‘dammmmit!  God, why can’t you give me more time?!?!  i worked and worked and worked my life away, and now it’s my time to retire… my time to live… i don’t want to die”

i feel that when we wait for ‘perfect’ timing, we waste what is indeed LIFE.  there is never a perfect time for anything… there never will be.  when we put off our happiness until tomorrow we take the chance that we will never find or see or feel that happiness.  we are a society of planners.  some of us may get lucky and actually get to plan and have those plans work out.  but the unexpected can be just as beautiful, just as fulfilling and just as perfect as those meticulously arranged.

the ground did not plan to have a river meander thru it to create a gorge; our ears may not plan on hearing a hawk crying on the wind… but it’s beauty pierces our hearts; we may not have planned a divorce but it might have led to a life overflowing with happiness and love.  this broken path becomes our life… and it becomes the canyons, valleys, gorges, trails that we will look back on and smile on with content.  sometimes the hardest stretches of trail are the most rewarding.  don’t forget this.  if your plan ‘fails’ that in and of itself is a new plan, a new exciting journey.  you will be accompanied by those who have had plans that have failed as well [is there anyone who cannot say this?], those who love you unconditionally, those who believe in your success and ability to persevere.

the post below, pineneedles, was something that i wrote last fall, when i was in one of my ‘thinking’ moods, as i am now. i love this blog, not many people check it, so i feel as if it is a real journal…and if someone does stumble across it, then it is like we are at a coffee shop just having a real conversation about what it means to be alive, and i hope that if there are any thoughts or similar feelings that arise whenever you may read these words, that you leave a comment…then it is a conversation between friends…

what am i thinking about today as i sit on my bed with the front door wide open as the slightly salty and humid ocean air creeps into my bedroom? if you ever REALLY want to get to know yourself, your limits, your humilities, your faults, your deep inner core….go to medical school. i am not one nor will i ever be the ‘medical school type’ i guess that i try to fake like i fit in in some way…i am not brilliant, i am not a ‘type A-everything has to be perfect or else’ person, i do not want to win any awards or work at a prestigious hospital, i don’t want to be top of my class or strut around in a white coat….i just want to take care of others. this is my drive, my reason for trudging through all the barriers…

in medicine, it is not so easy…when i first started i felt as though everyone was here for the exact same reason…to help others, and yes, some of them are…but i see through a lot. i have been through so much in my years on this planet and i am starving for someone who is genuine, who is not afraid to be themselves. it is these types of people that i am drawn to…like patricia at uncles billy’s resto-bar in portland. she stands behind the bar with silver hair flowing down her back…her weathered face shows what she has been through, but it’s hard to see these trials behind the brightness of her smile. although there are 5-6 older men, who have obviously been drinking quite a bit, standing like tall, thick trees at the bar she stands on her tippy-toes as i walk in the bar to make eye contact with me…and there it is, THERE IT IS!!! that genuine….bright, beautiful smile that you don’t see anymore. i don’t remember the last time someone smiled at me that way….NOT out of nervousness, or politeness, or even out of spite….but a genuine smile. we walked in…a tuesday night about 1030pm just looking for something made of chocolate…and i found this real person…this strong older woman who could handle her own with the drunken men at the bar…who could make a stranger have faith in the world again.

medical school has been an eyeopening experience. at the beginning of my first year…i came in with a sense of humility, an honest sense of just wanting to help…i didn’t realize the depth of craziness that came along with it. i got caught up in it too…the drive, the relentless chaos of being the best, doing the most…when i started doing really well in classes, i felt as though maybe i had become something else…but time and time again, i’m reminded that i’m still just human. all around me i became aware of the game of saving face in front of all the other medical students…i see people ashamed of how they scored on a test, or ashamed because they didn’t get a ‘high pass’ (an A) and i watch them beat themselves up over and over again. things that when i started this whole crazy trip, didn’t matter to me, and never have in my entire life….i am open, honest and KNOW that grades do NOT make a person, that being the top of my class doesn’t mean as much as taking the hand of an elderly woman who is sick in the hospital and looking into her eyes…

hmmm…the life of a doctor. it is a strange dichotomy…it is extraordinary, but at the same time, extraordinarily ordinary. i don’t know how i feel about these big things called boards…and i won’t know for about 3 weeks…i want to learn the most i can to help others to take care of their mothers, brothers, fathers…but how can i help others if i can’t live my life outside of medicine…dennis reminded me of a very important thing last night…that there has to be separation between self and school. i am not what i do. i knew this about 2 years ago, and told this advice to many, many people before med school. but in this exhaustion, there is delirium, and a questioning of how?

and where ARE all the genuine people? are you one of them? will you have a genuine smile next time i see you? will you not beat yourself up if you are not the best? will you not beat others up if they are not the best? don’t put up with me, enjoy my company, see the best…let go of yourself, of your insecurities and live. your goal should be greatness and not by the standards of any society, but by that feeling…that feeling of inspiration, of hope…be genuine…and accept. accept.

As is this soil which we plant so firmly our stars of night, we are all but a simulacre of the show which encompasses our being. When is it that passion will ignite the bees and the leaves which submit themselves to the bottoms of your shoes? I can taste revolution of thought, of heart, of sacrifice…as we exist in our surroundings it is with a fragile wind which we change the particles around us, as these atoms in turn transform me. The quilt is too warm, but I keep it on anyways, it reveals only my toes, and covers that which you want to see. I perceive the beauty in the consistency of each thread poised delicately against my body, parallel to the creases in my skin. To recognize the importance of the pebble in the ice, the crumb beneath the cement, the strings beneath your fingers, my hair freshly fallen on the landscape of your naked body. The strength of the wind cannot contort the blades of grass which grasp each finger to dance, to breathe beneath this table of water. So it is with curiousity that I thread the needle, with passion that I lay down my gun, with vigor that I envision the depths of the cave, with humility that I dance on the ocean, with kindness that I listen to your mind, with persistance that I reflect your love, and with perfection that I line up the pine needles in the corner of your mind. As you yearn for the juxtaposition of the lilypads it is with a gentle hand that I bring your spirit into focus, into view, into the whole which is revealed with the sunrise…to never be shrouded again.

I am sitting at one of my favorite coffee shops in Southern Maine, Union House, and this is a perfect time for my first entry…

A couple fellows are sitting next to me attempting to have a “deep” conversation…as this happens in coffee shops quite a bit, it is one that I have heard over and over. But this one particularly caught my attention…it pulled my attention away from my pharm studying…the reason? A 20 year old running for President.

~~~~ It is so interesting when folks get to a certain age that they feel as though they have lived through so much that they have the DEEPEST understanding of life possible. Maybe a run in with the law, maybe a brush with death…or maybe in this case, admission to a mental institute. What is it that gives us insight? The ability to rattle off a list of things we have been through or experienced? Or the thoughts and feelings that they force us to face? And then using these thoughts/feelings to piece together what it is what we want to be, what we want to do in our lives.

What gives us depth? What gives us knowledge? How do we relate to each other? I know for me, it isn’t just portraying a certain image…ooooo…I’m deep because I’m disturbed. What is it that you say, what meaning do your words have, where were they born, who are you? Don’t list me off places you have been, movies you have seen, books you have read, classes you have taken, these do not define you…or do they? They shouldn’t. Are we just a bunch of superficial conversations at coffee shops? Superficial conversations that we think are so incredibly deep…..criticizing America does not make us leftist….wearing cycling shorts doesn’t make us a cyclist, just because we wear holes in our jeans doesn’t mean that we didn’t spend $100 with them already there.

Each hole in my pair of jeans tells a story, a camping trip, a day of hiking, a bike ride downtown, now does this make me more of a person? No. But I do not wear them to paint such a picture…I wear them because they are comfortable, and I paid a lot of money for them years ago and I am going to get my money’s worth out of them. So in so many ways, we are a society that lives outwardly…we live only for others thoughts of us. Not good…this is where anorexia comes into play, spending money on plastic surgery…others’ opinions are more valuable than our own. As a disclaimer I would like to say that personal problems such as anorexia are not solely caused by this one thought of mine…but is a major influence I believe, although I have never battled it myself, but have known those who are close who have. Once we get away from public opinion and begin loving ourselves and realizing our own self-worth, then will we know the feelings of peace and we will recognize the depths of our soul and how they relate to those around us.

Is it enough in our lives to say…I climbed Everest. What does this mean? What is it to get to the top of a mountain dilerious, dizzy due to lack of oxygen…a moment that you may not even remember…do we climb for the sake of climbing? Or to just say that we did? And if so, does this mean that we climb to impress others? Do we wait for an expression from an external audience before we find satisfaction in our actions and thoughts? I believe that in the society in which we live, this is the case. We live to impress…to make impressions…and we are quick to judge….utilizing a list of countries that we have visited as a resume to impress others…so we can be ‘trendy’ we can say we’ve travelled…what do those experiences mean to us? What have we gained as humans? Who does this make us?

So because we can rattle off a few impressive places we’ve been, “deep” experiences that we’ve been through….does this make us capable to run for president? (Not comparable to our current President of course)…Why is it so ‘trendy’ these days to be admitted to mental institutues? Intimately knowing folks who have serious mental illnesses…it is anything but elegant, mysterious, or ‘trendy’. It is not something that we can list off as making us ‘deeper’ people, for I feel that it is much more than that…and it effects friends and family in not so much of a deep way…it is taxing, difficult, and is not something that can so simply be thrown into a mix of trips to Europe.

So will he win? Hmmm…..

This space on the virtual highway of the internet is just for thoughts….about everything, about anything. If you know me well, you know that I enjoy playing with words, with viewing the world from an odd standing, this life from a unique perspective. Get lost in thoughts along with me as I challenge you to sew your own.

Be well.
Much love all.
~~~~Gretchen~~~~