Call me prosaic

[gurdonark]

No matter how many times one tries to make it a musical, life has a way of becoming a laundry list. One keeps wanting to sing "Oh What a Beautiful Morning", but then one finds oneself sonorously reciting "extra starch?".

It's just hard to get around the fact that so much of life as it is lived is comprised of entirely mundane activity. My wife and I once took a glider ride over the Napa Valley in California. We cruised high above wine grape fields, neither threatened nor worried, just so sleek in our altitudinous splendor. In my mind, all life should be a glider ride above the Napa Valley. But the thing about those glider rides is that one pays one's money, one gets one's half an hour aloft, and then one is brought back down to earth gently, delightfully, and yet inevitably.

I'm perfectly content with the notion that the mundane tasks of our lives acquire a certain zen-like meditative something. If I'm not really putting food in my dogs' bowls, but instead performing some ancient ritual of merging into the exit lane from the wheel of life, I'm pretty much down for that. But when I look at my somewhat disorganized car, and my badly disorganized "art room", I realize that my zen is not tidy. It's a dishevel which runs beyond the merely physical. It's a whole spiritual imperfection. It's not so much that I lack good karma, it's that my karma is so boring.

Years ago, I dated a woman who, after some years of an Atman relationship (you know, we're 'not this, not that'), said to me "We say the same things to each other over and over. All that really changes is the phrasing". At the time I thought this mildly profound, albeit a really condescending way to tell me that I was not as important in her life as I then wished to be. But as the years go on, I realize that in so much of my life, I have a repertoire of ideas essentially five or six sentences long. All that changes is the number of prepositional phrases which I append to my deepest inmost five or six lines.

So the gospel of Gurdonark would not need both tablets to tell. I could probably get by on less than the full ten commandments, if I had to set out my credo in Old Testament terms. My ideas don't require the consumption of an entire burning bush. A lighted sheet of construction paper would probably hold the entirety of my inspiration. It's just who I am--and somehow it's comforting to know that if I ever did write a novel, it would probably involve robots and aliens and civilizations in which long discourses on xenotheology replaces good characterization. I notice lately that the only plots of novels I think of in recent years contain phrases like "radio telescope", "genome", or "the problem of faith in a multi-planetary context". Those who can interest, do. Those who cannot, bore into sci fi.

I don't really have a big problem with being one of life's fundamentally non-creative people. I am spared the soul agony of being misunderstood. There's not that much about me to understand, and I have been given in compensation a facility for dinner party cleverness which allows me to repackage my feeble ideas over and over. I also have an immensely practical turn of mind, which allows me to temper my dreams with analysis of how to integrate the cold, cruel real world into my thinking. I don't have some cosmic gift which is never understood. I have my little two cents to put into the collection plate, and I'm cool with the fact that somebody has to be the metaphoric widow, and just give the mite she has. If not everybody "gets" me, well, then let me tell you a secret. That widow may have gained the kingdom of Heaven when she gave her mite, but I'll bet she had a hard time getting dinner invitations.

My frustration, in short, is not that in the pantheon of the universe, I'd a minor, faintly visible minor constellation, visible only because of a quirk at a community college planetarium,
where during assembly of the star projector, somebody mistook some dust for spots that needed to show up during the planetarium show.
My frustration, instead, is that for a boring person, I sure am deficient at mundane tasks.

Every day I deal with people who eschew the creative life of the inward mind, but in return are great salespeople, snappy dressers, neat as the proverbial sewing pin, or really good with their hands. I suppose, really, that each of these people are truly creative, and then sublimate their creativity to be truly something else. But I'm a one trick pony that forgot his trick.
I sublimate my lack of creativity into a lack of skill at a world of other things.

Don't get me wrong, I don't want to be Martha Stewart. For one thing, spending so much time on the telephone discussing biotech stocks would get old after a while. But I've heard that when someone loses a basic sense, the other senses strengthen a bit in order to compensate. All righty, then, Universe--you're not going to give me a screenplay, or a novel, or even a solid poem. Why can't you at least give me the ability to always ensure the oil is changed at 3,000 miles and the ability to effortlessly tidy an office? It seems a small compensation to ask.

At least I have the southern ability to speak with strangers without entirely boring them in five seconds. Of course, this requires a certain "hey y'all" thing which I absorbed by osmosis growing up in what must have been the most frighteningly friendly town in America. It's not always the sort of discussion mode into which one can slip "hey, what's up with that Man Ray guy? Do you get him at all?". When I move beyond this type of pleasant but mildly glib talk-about-the-weather-and-how-'bout-them-Razorbacks mode of speech, then I can see eyes glaze--politely, in the most faintly discernible way, but definitively.

So I see life as that old short story about the guy who is left to choose between two doors--behind one is a lady, and behind one is a tiger. I've written before, I believe, that I personally choose neither. But in fact, in life, I think I often choose each, and guess what? Behind the rightward door is laundry detergent, and behind the leftward door is a broom.

I suppose the upshot of all this is that I find myself redoubling my efforts to accept what I have, rather than longing for what I am not. What I have is not bad--a kind wife, a nice home, a job I can do, the ability to pitch in and help once in a while, a grip on reality. What I don't have, a novel, a gift for drawing, the ability to get my prom date to slow dance to "Maybe I'm Amazed", well, maybe these are things one can live without. Maybe I'm one of life's mop carriers, and not even that good at doing the floors.
But I suppose we all help as best we can, and if I am to help in prose, not poetry, that's okay by me.

Comments

[laruth.livejournal.com]

Another thoughtful post. Thanks for sharing!

I suppose the upshot of all this is that I find myself redoubling my efforts to accept what I have, rather than longing for what I am not.

This is so true. Believing this will help anyone to come to terms with who they really are.

[wildgarden.livejournal.com]

ah, dinner party cleverness. now there's a skill I could use...

[marstokyo.livejournal.com]

Ah gurdonark! He's a simple but happy man. Or so he thinks.

[nacowafer.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I think it's all a ruse, to throw us off track! He's got somthing going on...

Re:

[marstokyo.livejournal.com]

Me thinks he doth protest too much. I've heard this rant before, and I don't buy it for a minute.

[gregwest98.livejournal.com]

It would be very entertaining to imagine a get-together of all the people in gurdonark's friends list and for me to sit in the corner watching all the others cross-examine him seeking to find out what he "really" is and watching their expressions of dismay as they find out that he is exactly as he appears to be.

I would very much enjoy that. As long as there were some teeny theaters there to examine.

OK, You're prosaic

[gregwest98.livejournal.com]

Takes one to know one you know.

Perhaps heaven is like an eternal glider ride and is a sort of repayment for all the mundane things we have to do all our lives. Renumeration for all the dog-doo we had to pick up.

There are many times, particularly lately, when I feel that since my own gospel would also not fill two tablets, I should just take to the forest - hermit-like - ( or Thoreau-like) and do nothing but the mundane. If you simplify enough, you might finally minimize the number of ordinary things you would have to do and have time to think great thoughts.

But nobody would invite you to dinner, that's for sure. But nobody invites me now anyway because they assume we're too busy doing something else.

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

My goodness. I feel much more mysterious, or much more self-deluded, or something! :)

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

I must begin looking for that track I'm throwing you off!

Re: OK, You're prosaic

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

I love that image of Heaven as a glider ride.
I could use that walk in the woods about now!

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

I like that idea--something going on. If only the reality were so mysterious!

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

Your journal suggests that you have a facility with words. Isn't that what a dinner party is all about?

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's what I'm trying to say, but you said it much better.

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

You know, I think I'm exactly the person I describe in my journal, too, except perhaps more boring and such. It would be fun to meet all my LJ friends, but I worry I'd bore them all!

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

actually, on second thought, I'd much rather sit in a room, filled with candles, in which teeny theaters were arrayed in those lighted boxes. That would be much more fun than talking to me.

[asphalteden.livejournal.com]

I think maybe we need to define boring, before you begin to call yourself boring.

Trying to distill your life down to one word is a Bad Idea. Someone once called me "droll" and I spent many moments trying to decide whether it was a compliment or an insult. Either way, it is perhaps a true sentiment.

To me, you are not boring. I think if we were placed into a bamboo cage together, we could probably find many things to talk about--at the very least our basic situation of being in a bamboo cage together.

Perhaps your strength is this: you've selected your friends and acquaintances so carefully, that you begin to feel less "X" ("X" being the unknown, super-scientific, Excitement Factor) than they are. But in reality, you've done a lovely job editing out all of the plain "unexceptionalism" out there. There's a lot of mediocrity in the world to be sure. But you are certainly not the king of that castle (or even a serf). More of a pirate in a warship on the coast, firing cannonballs at all the walls.

For God's sake, you made a CD out of electric football field noises! That is horrifically exciting!

I see this post has started to sound like a pep-talk which was not my intention. I just thought you sold yourself short once again in your typically charming, self-effacing way.

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

What a kind post. Self-effacement is the Arkansas regional characteristic. This post is not my best, but it was what was on my mind, so I posted it :).
Thanks for your kind words. If we were trapped on a desert island, I'm sure we'd talk for years. If ever my wife and I are in NY or NJ, we'll certainly look you and your wife up!

[asphalteden.livejournal.com]

Well you are certainly welcome here. In about a year's time, I'll even have a guest room for you both to stay in!

Re:

[gregwest98.livejournal.com]

I don't think they'd be bored; they'd be too busy trying to psychoanalyze you to find out the man behind the journal. They don't seem the types to give up easily. They'd be busy at it for hours.

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

I really value marstokyo's and nacowafer's comments. They're good folks. I think it is probably a fair criticism of my journal that the simplicity/complexity and "poor, poor simple me" thread has been exhausted in my journal.
In my own defense, this odd feeling of being slightly out of place everywhere obtains for me in LJ as well. I'm mildly fluent in a lot of languages--artsy people, science people, law people, etc., but I'm not VERY fluent in any languages. The result is the old jack of all trades, master of none thing that is pretty much me. The only thing is I wish I were a jack of carpentry and music, if I have to be a master of none, but that's life :).

This line of thinking, and probably middle age, always has me returning to the simple essentials, but perhaps another person should instead marvel in the complexity of it all. But as you know, I've always had this internal dialogue, and always been mightily amused by it. I don't think they mean to psychoanalyze so much as to gently note that I journal on this topic an awful lot :). It's a fair comment, but I don't think the theme will disappear from my journal. But I would never want their comments to disappear. I'm glad both read my journal.

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

I've already got the guest bedroom if y'all ever come to TX, but my music collection falls far short of yours!

[mockinggreylock.livejournal.com]

It's not so much that I lack good karma, it's that my karma is so boring.

Boring to whom? To you? To others? Why is it boring, when everyone else (middle Americans, perhaps) experiences the same primarily mundane life? Methinks this is the common mental struggle of the contented -- what makes our lives special, when most of what we experience is passing moments of normalness?

Finding the timeless experience in the passing moments...that is a the little known art of contentment :)

I don't really have a big problem with being one of life's fundamentally non-creative people.

Non-creative people do not write poetry. I doubt that the non-creative would go so far as to write down their own thoughts. I know plenty of non-creative people (who have nothing going on between their ears, and you simply aren't that limited.

You have your own perspective, which is original and unique and will never be here again. With chagrin I must acknowledge that the annoying thing about uniqueness is that everyone possesses it, but not everyone takes advantage of that. Most folks, it seems to me, go through life trying to brush their uniqueness under the mat of Popular Opinion, Popular Interest, and Popular Media. (which is not to say that that which is popular/canned and sold is wholly evil or anything absolutist like that...it just enables people to not think much at all -- not thinking is the bad thing).

As for being non-creative...you may not be an "artist", but that doesn't bar you from living a life of complete self-expression :)