Rituals
While in Australia, most nights, my dear sweet friend M and I would get home from work/school and promptly park ourselves on the living room floor (a habit I think, from the early days when M's furniture hadn't yet arrived) and decadently enjoy a glass of wine and a fine spread of seaweed crackers, old crumbly cheddar, grapes and the requiste creamy yet stinky cheese.
A few fridays ago I had the pleasure of performing this exercise solo and raised my glass to her for her wise lesson on how to enjoy decadence without apology.
M and I have since exchanged emails and after telling her about my Friday, she commented how she too missed the routines from our days at 5 Hill St.
As someone who has come to loathe the world Routine, it gave me pause. A long one.
I have become a great deal more mindful of the activities that fill my day and do what I can to avoid falling into Routines.
M and I tossed around the concept of routine and after fretting that in my attempt to get out of old routines, that I was merely adopting new ones to fill space and time, she thankfully and intelligently reframed it for me. Rituals. Bam.
And it was a ritual we shared. One I was fully engaged in and appreciative of. (methinks that sentence is a dangling participle or pacifier or something of the like and require a grammarpants to correct me)
I've also come to recognize all of the brilliant rituals i've embraced over the past year and so wildy cherish - monday dinners - Saturday mornings with the paper - stripercize class - spinning - blogging - the simple act of walking to work....
So many things I've built and am building into my life that I thought I put there to fill space - look entirely new to me.
Engaged in with purpose, mindful and cognizant, routines fail to exist.
A few fridays ago I had the pleasure of performing this exercise solo and raised my glass to her for her wise lesson on how to enjoy decadence without apology.
M and I have since exchanged emails and after telling her about my Friday, she commented how she too missed the routines from our days at 5 Hill St.
As someone who has come to loathe the world Routine, it gave me pause. A long one.
I have become a great deal more mindful of the activities that fill my day and do what I can to avoid falling into Routines.
M and I tossed around the concept of routine and after fretting that in my attempt to get out of old routines, that I was merely adopting new ones to fill space and time, she thankfully and intelligently reframed it for me. Rituals. Bam.
And it was a ritual we shared. One I was fully engaged in and appreciative of. (methinks that sentence is a dangling participle or pacifier or something of the like and require a grammarpants to correct me)
I've also come to recognize all of the brilliant rituals i've embraced over the past year and so wildy cherish - monday dinners - Saturday mornings with the paper - stripercize class - spinning - blogging - the simple act of walking to work....
So many things I've built and am building into my life that I thought I put there to fill space - look entirely new to me.
Engaged in with purpose, mindful and cognizant, routines fail to exist.
posted by two steps at 10:40 PM
2 Comments:
Funny that you should mention rituals.
I'm in the middle of growing my examine beard.
A ritual I have been taking part in since my undergrad days.
There's two odd things about this ritual. One. I no longer actually write exams. I have essays to finish that take about 3 to 4 weeks to write. Maybe I should call it an essay beard.
Two. I can't now, nor ever really have been able to, grow what most people would call a beard. It's mostly just patches of slightly unshaven hair. Maybe I should call it essay scruff.
And don't knock routines. They serve a valuable role. It would be difficult to function if you had to think about every experience as if it was something completely novel. As romantic as that idea sounds, it's just easier to know that the bus comes at time x. It's a routine. So your brain can stop thinking about it, and think about something more interesting. Like rituals.
well put my friend, well put.
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