What are we doing with our daily lives? I thought about this early this morning on my way into work. I saw someone getting the daily paper and I wondered if they were happy in the house and neighborhood in which they lived. I wondered if they had job satisfaction and if they were doing what they always dreamed of doing as a kid.
I thought of this again as I attended the swearing in ceremony of our new State's Attorney. This is a guy who began in community college, then went on to graduate from a 4 year college with honors. He attended law school part-time while working and supporting a family, then graduated from there with honors. He worked for the Navy, became President of our local Bar Association, became partner in his firm, and has been a really good guy by everyone's accounts all the way through. I don't get the impression that this guy sought out this position, he was urged to run. I wondered if positions of leadership found him, or because of his work ethic shining for everyone to see, he was secretly sending out signals that he was a man of integrity and quality and should be in positions of power? Is this what he dreamed of being as a child? Is he happy where life has led him?
Then I turned that reflection back upon myself. We're gearing up for our next municipal election. I met with two candidates this weekend. They haven't filed or announced yet, so this was a planning session. And I wondered, how do I always find myself in the middle of politics? Politics didn't really interest me as a child. Being the center of attention never interested me, even though I sought out music and theatre, it was never about being in the spotlight, so much as doing something I enjoyed. So here we are back to politics. I've sworn I can only help with one campaign this time, so of course I met with 2 candidates to plan two campaigns. I'm currently scouting out possibilities for a 3rd candidate. I'm so ridiculous! I never dreamed when I was a young girl that I would be living this life. I'm seldom certain what this life is exactly. I often feel like I'm running in too many directions and never really accomplishing anything. I'm happy with this life I am leading. As haphazard as this all seems to me at times, I do know my actions have been deliberate. I just still don't know where I'm going in this life, probably toward a life of service in some capacity, I just haven't arrived at it yet. So I'm treating my political activism and volunteerism as a training ground. I'm shrouding myself in faith, that whatever plans the universe has for me, they wouldn't continually plop me down in the middle of political messes unless I needed that background for what I will eventually tackle.
I think of life as a journey, as something I haven't arrived at yet, and then I'm reminded of a section of a book I read many years ago that gave me an official Oprah "Ah-ha" moment.
The girl in the book has been organizing her life, saving, planning, taking care of details so that she can finally take a spiritual trip to India. Before she's able to go on her trip, she meets and falls in love with a famous man. Of course, she's totally pissed. She tells her spiritual adviser, "I don't have time for this! I've purchased my plane ticket. This is not what I planned. He pushes my buttons. He's got too many issues to deal with. I don't know who I am as a person when I'm with him. I've planned my whole life for this spiritual journey, this spiritual growth. My journey is set for India." To which her spiritual adviser replies, "but my dear, perhaps this is your India."
Thanksgiving is upon us once again. Last year I think we had around 14, the year before that 24 and after much pressure from me, I think we're at 11 this year. I love having all the people over, but there is such a thing as too many people. I mean, I would like to have some leftovers when this is all done, that's also a traditional part of Thanksgiving!
So I was looking back through my previous Thanksgiving post pictures and came across these two. This first one is from a couple years back before we got a large table. We had to line up 3 tables end-to-end just to seat everyone together. The thing that struck me about this photo though was how empty my china cabinet was. Wow, it looks nice. 
Contrast that shot with this one where we now have a super long table to properly seat everyone comfortably and look at the clutter in the china cabinet now. I don't think you can see as much in this photo, but now we have a couple sets of dishes in there, countless wine glasses of various types, platters, bowls. I kinda miss the clean, uncluttered look that it had briefly after we first painted the dining room. Maybe once I get all the cabinets installed in the kitchen I will be able to de-clutter the china cabinet once again. Anyway, hope all of you who celebrate the day are able to share it with people you enjoy and not just people you tolerate. :-)
