beginnings and endings

written a few years ago. things have improved since then, but the basic concept still rings true to me.

Young people write songs about life being a circle. Joni Mitchell did when she was young. So did Harry Chapin. I don't think you'll find an older person comparing life to a circle. Life is beginnings and endings and the older you get, the more you see this because the endings come much quicker as you get older. Youth comes and goes. Childhood friends. Places we live. Relationships. Most simply move on, or we do. Some die. There is very little continuity to life. It's a series of events. My life at twenty has very little in common with my life in my 50s. I am very lucky in having a wife who's been with me throughout those decades. and a daughter. Those are the only common threads in what was the fabric of my life then and the fabric of my life now. The rest is endings and beginnings. I think perhaps life is much more like a quilt than a circle. A quilt made of random fragments of material all patched together. This fragment, perhaps a friend who came and went. This fragment my school years. This fragment my aspirations. Beginnings and endings.

 

Another year is almost gone. Another square in the quilt. A year saddled with problems yet filled with joy. Another ending. I face the next year with a little trepidation. There are problems to be solved. New trails to blaze, and I'm no adventurer. I prefer status quo, not change. I prefer continuity, not endings and beginnings. But my preferences have very little to do with real life. We play the hands we're dealt. The best i can do is hope for a decent hand... or bluff like hell if i get a bad one. Folding is not an option. I will not be the one creating an ending.

 

So I look back at the past year, breathe a sigh of relief that we made it, and turn toward the new beginning. Hoping for the best, contemplating the worst, expecting something in between. And if this sounds overly contemplative, forgive me. New beginnings scare me. and endings bother me more and more and more.

 

I wish you all peace and a happy new year.

Reviews

[cest la vie]

How fitting I am reading this today, on a day I feel rather lost and alone..
twenty years as a wife are no more and I wonder do I have the energy to be a partner again. Then the thought of that chair beside mine as I enter those aging years makes me numb with grief..
So we just keep waking up, and stepping forward.
I thank you for sharing these thoughts and perhaps helping me on the cobblestone path of life.

Very well written..

[Ladysue]

Beautiful words..hopeful and reflective...and no it doesn't sound overly contemplative...wonderful...

[Emily B]

gentle, rea and hopeful words, just what I needed today

[Marie Anzalone]

I never thought life was a circle, and I am [relatively] young. I've always seen it as a series of unfolding spirals. You pass by the same ways several times, the major themes- problem areas and streangths, until you find the balance. But the rest unfolds in all directions, spiraling outwards, with us able to maintain less control, and experience more joy and sorrow the less tightly we try to keep our grip.

I do forgive you for contemplating. I awoke at 3 AM this morning with plenty to contemplate and let go of myself. What a perfect peice to read, in light of those feelings of my own. Thank you for your introspective slice of prose.

[Doctor JKC]

I just put the possibility of getting back with
a very fine old girl friend to an end moments
ago. I'm too old for getting endless problems.
I subtract as much as possible rather than
add or multiply.
I live more and more solitary and have no
family left.
Just a single handful of close friends and
the vague possibility of a new GF who lives
in Finland most of the year. Quite a wonder though.
I think Phil Ochs nailed it in his song, Outside Of A
Small Circle Of Friends. He hanged himself a few
blocks from where I live just now West of a few blocks
where Kerouac died of alcoholism at his mom's house.

At age 57 I totally agree with your piece and do my
best to remain very fit (martial arts classes and all)
knowing it means nothing. I play the circle game because
I don't want to grow up but understand the futility
of the process.

A very well done piece,
Jack