I look in the mirror in the evening and I look the same as I did in the morning, except perhaps a bit “work weary”. I go to sleep and look in the mirror the next morning and still, no change. At least that’s what my mirror says. It lies - it’s all in the perception of the reflection.
Some people say you should live one day at a time. But living my life one day at a time didn’t show the effect of the many days at a time I’ve lived. Days into weeks into months into years. I realized something was different. The mirror I’ve been relying on to make sure I’m still me imprinted an image on my brain and I’ve only been comparing that to my brain's digital image from a day or week before. I needed to dig way back in my brain’s archives to try and request the image from many years prior. When this antique image appears I need to realize this image is just the visual placeholder for everything stored in the files behind it.
I’ve concluded the deep differences between those files and the ones I’ve experienced today is called “Life”. At least I think so. This changes everything for me. I really had thought nothing much had changed within me over the years. I knew my hair and body has changed, but I blame that on stress, lack of sleep and exercise, and my ambitious search for the perfect cheeseburger. The outside of me is easy to recognize. My activities don’t seem to have changed either - I still play piano, take photos, go to work, fly several times a month, watch the same TV shows, and perform the same routines of rising, dressing, then later undressing, watching TV, and going to bed. Repeat daily.
Like I said - nothing really SEEMS to have changed. Turns out I’ve been missing (or ignoring) the files underneath. If the top layer is the body and the superficial and visual representation of myself; and beneath it is the group of day-to-day and week-to-week and month-to-month actions and activities, planned or unplanned; then way down below all of that is the invisible glue that keeps everything together, hopefully. It is where my personality lives, my humor, my joys and sadness, and my character. The various file names include such notables as “family”, “friends”, “loves”, and yes, some called “hates”, although I try to put those in the back of the box. Other files are in there too - “emotions”, “feelings”, “fears”, “happiness”, “anxiety”, both “helpfulness” and “helplessness”, “charity”, both “selffullness” and “selflessness”, “proud of's”, “hurt by's”, “hopes”, “dreams”, (although often my hopes and dreams files get mixed together and by then nothing really gets done in either.) There are a lot of other files and each of us has a different stack of them.
So I’ve decided Life is just all of them put together - All the files with all the little paperclipped notes and post-its hanging out of them. Try to leave anything out and it feels incomplete. Well, sometimes you feel it, but unfortunately, sometimes you don’t but that doesn’t mean it’s not missing. You just haven’t caught up enough to spot the hole in your life yet. But it’s coming. Definitely coming. OK.
I’m not really sure what, if anything, is underneath supporting this immense layer of files, but I imagine it’s probably God, the Universe, Humanity, or most likely all three smooshed together like a coldstone wonderland.
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