Sunday, March 7, 2010

Reflections

I have a lot on my mind, but don’t’ know where to begin. I just had some email exchanges with someone who I have known longer anyone else. They began with exchanging birthday wishes and morphed into the habitual ideological clashes. He is as far right politically as I am far left. We met in October or November of 1968 at a campus bonfire in the very early days of Florida Technological University (now the University of Central Florida). He was from Kentucky, I was born in Ohio but grew up in Miami. He was a microbiology major and I was a math major (until I changed to zoology in my sophomore year). I started smoking when I realized my lifelong dream of being a mathematician wasn’t going to be a reality. Never thought of that connection before: my dreams up in smoke! That would be funny, if it wasn’t.


I have been reflecting on quite a bit since turning 60. I have attempted in the last week to stop smoking. Not doing so good. The patches really aren’t working this time. The side effects of Chantix scare me. I can’t really afford private hypnosis sessions. I’ve been vegetarian for over 20 years, although I’ve fallen off the wagon from time to time. I know that giving up dairy products and eggs is what I want to do. Like smoking, that’s not going so good either. Instead of taking better care of myself, my house and even my car, I choose to focus on everything “outside” of me. Whether it’s my job, my critters, or the world – it beats housework, cooking better meals, improving my health and fixing things around the house that need fixing. All too often it is easier to face the demons in the world than those within ourselves.

Seriously, if I am going to take action (quit smoking, exercise, lose weight, eat better and more ethically), time is running out. Clearly, at 60, there are fewer tomorrows to put this off to. Is there a Procrastinators Anonymous? Guess I’ll get back to the laundry and litterboxes…..with critters there is always laundry and litterboxes to do.

And if you care about the planet, please check out this article from The Nation: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100322/hari

1 comment:

  1. Hey me too! I got an exercycle out of someone's garage that they didn't want. It was broken but I fixed it to be workable. I am doing 30 minutes a night but I plan to up that. We should go on this quest together, cyberly speaking!

    ReplyDelete