3 March 2017

Really, what makes a life? What makes life worth living? What makes your world a better place? What makes it bearable day after miserable day? 

I think the answer is several bits of information, really. First, I believe that everyone makes mistakes. You learn from them, you move on. But, before the lesson can take hold, you also have to believe and understand that you are never going to be perfect. You are never going to do everything right every single time. You are never going to be the person you see in a sitcom, the person who can frank up their lives every day and still come out with all their friends, their enemies, and their money and sanity still completely intact. It’s a farce, and it also makes it hard for anyone who is a non-sitcom character to make it in this world. To live in the real world and make it through the day to day jaunt and hijinks out there by others can be really difficult at times. I guess that is what makes us all human. Making it through every day is hard no not something to be blown off as easy, especially for some folks. 
I often wonder how life must be like for some of my clients. Those who have nowhere to go. Those who are frightened, who don’t have much money and have no family in town, those who really have no education to back them up should their current venture fail. Those people make me very thankful for my life as it is. But, my life is also somewhat more complicated than theirs in a sense. Some of them have no jobs, no bosses to order them around, no dress clothes, no office politics, no others-imposed goals. Do they have it worse off or better off? Some days I really wonder. I have no real work boss, it’s true.  What I do have, though, are 70-odd clients depending on me to finish the work we’ve started. To do a good job. To make their lives better. Sometimes getting all of that done, within the law and rules imposed on my prifession by others, can be very difficult.

So,wit,was I think that I am the fixer and the preventer. More the former than the latter in most cases, honestly, because people don’t tend to come to me before something has gone astray. Usually it’s after the fact, when things have gone completely belly up no they now need you to fix whatever it is. Sometimes they have franked it up so much that there is no fixing it; you can only do so much with what you’re given. Sometimes people get mad about the law, or the rules, to which I am bound and cannot break. It is a tough position in which to be, that which makes me humble with a great deal of unrest at times. Insomnia, it seems, has become my nightly frenemy, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, till one of us depart, etc. It is not a good friend. Really, I wish it would leave my presence forever. 

As I sit here on this outdoor terrace, gracefully shaded by palm trees, in the shade, I think about life, insomnia, the planes flying overhead, and the fact that I will most likely never grace this place again with my presence. It’s a nice hotel, but there are so many from which to choose that I like to spread the wealth so to speak, and try something new the next time I’m here. We talked the other evening, while walking along the beach, of our ability, now without children, me with my own business, of dropping and going on a cruise for one of those last minute deals sometime soon. We go to Europe later this year on a long ago planned trip, but travel, as it truly heals my soul, is where I would love to spend the majority of my time. 

Given another life, backpacking in Europe would definitely be on my list of accomplishments. Who knows, maybe it still can be?