Nada, Zilch, Zero… Niente

Posted January 16th, 2005 by Michelle

I have had two full delicious days to do exactly nothing. It’s been wonderful. I’ve given myself the time to do whatever I wanted, even if it meant watching all three Indiana Jones movies back-to-back on network television. I spared myself the tsunami aid concert with Madonna singing “Imagine”- although I did call and donate to the Red Cross- and instead I watched bad TV, read, ate lots of broccoli, and slept in. But by the end of today I was ready to *do* something, so I worked on the music for a show I’m doing in a few weeks, and then sat down at my computer to do a whole lot of nothing. This included reading many of the stories I’ve written in the last year, and also revisiting the novel I started about a year and a half ago. I was a little frightened, opening that document, because I honestly couldn’t remember what it was about. In some late-night blog ramblings around that time, I spoke of writing about all that ailed my romantic life, and I was afraid that perhaps I really was going over to the dark side in that novel. Instead, though, I found a sweet, even funny story, about hope and friendship and love. I even wanted to keep reading when it ended quite abruptly at Chapter 6. Seems I got all my vitriol out on my blog. I’m glad I don’t do that anymore. But I was suprised at the story I’d begun, and found myself rooting for the heroine. The crazy thing is that I couldn’t remember writing most of it, couldn’t remember the creative process that put those words to paper. And maybe that’s why I could enjoy it- I didn’t remember it. I can’t pick up where I left off, so it will remain the beginning of a sweet story of hope.

I also looked through all of the pictures my friends and I have taken over the last year- they are all on my computer- and they made me think of a journal entry that I wrote on Tuesday, October 2nd, 2003, when I was trying to decide between moving to Napa and joining the Peace Corps: “I fear to make a decision based on fear. Jordi and I were talking about the root of that fear, and it is not a fear of Africa, of lost conveniences, of heat, of exhaustion, of isolation, of pit toilets and bucket baths, of malaria, of AIDS. I don’t exactly fear any of that. What I fear is lost time. What will my life be when I get back in the spring of 2006? And why in god’s name am I asking such a stupid question as that? Why would I stall an adventure for fear of what I cannot know, namely my life on the other side? It doesn’t make sense. It would be a terrible way to live.

On the other hand, do I give up my novel? Do I give up what might be a great choice for me, a great change waiting for me in Napa Valley? Well, two things. If I were to go to Napa instead of Africa, there remains the possibility of the exact same thing happening in spring of 2006. I cannot know that I will be any happier, any more actualized, that my life will be very different than it is today. I hope it is, I intend to make it so, but there are simply no guarantees that one choice or the other will make my life better. It could go either way.”

it is not yet spring of 2006, but at least I can look back on that and know that my life IS very different than it was that October. I can see it in my home, in my job, and in the pictures of the last year. I do not necessarily think I made the “right” choice in coming to Napa over Peace Corps, but it has certainly been a “good” decision. I would have been a year into my service right now had I gone to Africa, and I do wonder almost every day what it would have been like. I still am committed to doing it someday. But for now, a wee photo montage of the life I live today.

Every morning, this is what I see on my run:

the not-so-impressive but still lovely Napa river

the winter green among the dormant vines

the mustard flowers just starting to bloom

the beauty and wonder of the valley floor in Wintertime

And finally, the best part of my day…



… my friends.