Moving Fins

Sometimes I know it appears as though I’m saying that only writing fathers have the stress of time with its tentacles around their necks.  But no, I know it’s everybody, especially students, or anyone with a family and a job and some degree of a social life.  It’s all of us.  This morning for me was especially hurried with a meeting in the morning and my son waking early, after somewhat of a rough night with Emma waking two or three times (count, lost) wanting love, or feed, or love then feed.  No time to write this morning but on my phone, just after 4AM.  I had time to write, finally, and I knew as well that it’d be a long day for me this Sunday, for this writing daddy, but it’s not just me.  It’s all of us.  I’m sharing the idea that we don’t resist time, or fight it, or let it incense us, but work with it— let its intrusion make us more creative with what we do with our time.  Time is something that can be menacing or strung in adoration.  Choose the later, trust me.  Let yourself believe that all time is music, and even if you’re not completely free to yourself it’s there, it’s a prize.

Finally with some time to write now, in the vineyard early, in my car with laptop open staring at vines, and the I see— time’s all around me.  With the age of the vines, my age, how much time I have and don’t have.  But no value in becoming angry, irked, or climatically irritated.  Just work with what you have—  NO.  Control what you have.  Swim in the time you have, whether you’re “free” or not.  You know what, we’re always free.  Even if we’re watching the kids, or in class, or at a family thing, at work…  WE. ARE. FREE.  The time you do have to do what you want is yours, so create within that.  And if you’re a writer, realize the value of the time you do have to finish the pieces you need.  And if you’re not a writer, or not a creative at all, then enjoy the peace and zenful tide of your time.  It’s yours.  All yours.  To be alive is a prize.

The writer-papa now just breathes, listens to his French track, “Je Suis Seul Ce Soir”, and plans the day.  What I want done and what I can afford to not complete.  But why obsess over that?  Why not just enjoy the moment?  Right here in my car staring at the vines, realizing where I am, a place where people travel from all corners and quirks of Earth to see.  And here I am, able to enjoy on daily pulses.  You don’t have to be in wine’s world or industry to be this thankful, or appreciative of your time.  We all have moments that can be ours, but we have to recognize our power to do that.  If you want the day to be amazing, or life-changing, even if you have little time to yourself, then make it that way.  I don’t care if you’re a writer or no— WRITE IT THAT WAY, through your attitude and actions.  What a gift.  Freed.