Wanting-to-Count-Things

I just finished showering and breakfasting. Actually I got up a while ago and sat in bed reading one of my journals (it was a bad idea). I don't need to be thinking about the past when there's so much in the present to think about. It's funny, in leaving, one of the hardest things to leave behind are my journals. I have a lot of them. I think I'm on #36. Of course, I often write with bleedy pens, so sometimes I can only use one side of the pages...so it's more like 20 journals. I don't know.

But these journals are my outlet. They are where I do most of my writing, and where I learn to be honest when the world around me keeps whisper-yelling "Hide! Hide! Don't come out and don't talk!" Journals are like photo albums to me...when I read them I can often picture the exact event, remember the same feelings, remember exactly what people said.

So going to Ukraine and leaving my journals behind is kind of an act of releasing and letting go of things I'm tempted to hold on to, good and bad. I'm a little freaked out about it, but it's probably the best thing that ever happened to me. I kind of get a new start. It's not that I forget good memories, but I have to quit clinging to them.

It's like C.S. Lewis said in Out of the Silent Planet (the only book I read out of his Space Trilogy), something about how continung to hold on to pleasure past the moment it occurs robs it of it's sweetness. It's like gluttony. Donuts are good when you eat them, but continuing to eat and eat and eat them makes you sick.

I love the quote from Gloria Dump in the movie Because of Winn Dixie:

"You gotta love it while you got it and then let it go."

Yesterday it was great to be home and relax. I did a lot of little stuff, like visit with Mom, measure my carry on bag, organize the mound of stuff-to-pack in the corner of my room, and make shopping lists. Sometimes life feels so crazy that it's nice to have something organized and set out in nice, neat, orderly lists. It's sort of a false hope, but hey, it worked for yesterday!

It reminded me of this line from a Winnie the Pooh story:

"Now it happened that Kanga had felt rather motherly that morning, and Wanting to Count Things- like Roo's vests, and how many bars of soap there were left, and the two clean spots in Tigger's feeder..."

Hehe. Only it was sort of just me and my suitcases, nothing much to mother. But I "counted" a lot of things. And I can't explain why in the world that makes me happy!