I hope that this is not a humble brag. Amy and I are trying to relax on the weekend, not do all the “stuff” that we didn’t finish. It is surprisingly hard to avoid the feeling that we are losing ground. We’ll never catch up.
She’s reading a book. And, I’m writing this. That seems like relaxing to me.
I did mow the lawn because it is tiny. And I did install the hardware on our bathroom door. And I have one more thing to do for the hot tub.
But, I also played tennis with Nathalie this morning, which was great. We split some tie-breaker games and she is improving her serve. She hit a lot of good shots and had she not double-faulted as much, she would have beat me pretty bad.
I do not know why we are so pre-occupied with finishing the painting or whatever. Life is short, we all know that. It just isn’t easy to know what all that means.
I would love to tell you that our trip really showed us that the Italian culture really taught us that. It would complete a stereotypical story arc. I can’t say that, however, because we were hard driving tourists with plenty of other similar folks in our lanes. Tuscany was great, beautiful. But we mostly could have done the same kind of relaxing anywhere – minus the picture postcard locale. So why don’t we relax like we did in Tuscany if it can done anywhere?
The whole idea of limited time on the planet has been a theme with me. I don’t fully know why. I’ve mentioned the fact that I have an artificial heart valve. In fact, I feel almost like I should have a footnote for it. HV. Whenever a thought seems to be influenced by that specific fact I could just footnote it.
HV – refers to the fact that FXL had an artificial heart valve installed in place of his congenitally mal-formed aortic valve in in Feb. 2003. It should last for 15 to 20 years. After that, well, fingers-crossed, eh?
I think the HV effect is that it magnifies or amplifies certain melancholy feelings I have about life. Staying in an unsatisfying job for example seems like a sometimes necessary consequence of being an adult, father/husband who has one taking SAT and ACT tests for her next four year commitment. Sometimes that same job feels like an incredible waste of precious few years on my personal trip on the third planet from the sun.
The concept of a bucket list has always escaped me. I have a tendency to avoid yearning. It comes with being a realist, I guess. If I want to do or try something, even consideration of it has to extend from a pragmatic possibility. For example, I don’t want to win a gold medal at the Olympics but I do want to swim an IM in a swim meet. In fact, I wanted to swim in a swim meet so I did it. But I don’t want to swim the English Channel. I don’t want to travel to outer space. I wouldn’t mind visiting Scandinavia.
There are some things that I want to do. And oddly, lately, I feel like I might be gaining some momentum, overcoming bodily inertia, toward them. It’s a bit odd if I am completely honest.
