Sometimes it’s important to capture the moment because the moment represents one’s life the way it ought to be; not just on occasion, but always. Therefore, I’m capturing the moment.
I made dinner tonight, which included grilling some vegetables (squash, onions, and jalapeños, if you must know) and warming some meat I’d cooked earlier. As I was getting ready to serve, I walked outside to the grill and succumbed to the spell cast by the sky. The only appropriate place to eat dinner tonight, I said to myself, was right there, outside, on the deck. I plated the meals, then called to my wife to come out. “Would you like to eat on the deck?” I asked. She agreed. And we did.
As we finished our meals, I noticed the first bright star appear just as darkness fell. That, my friends, is a moment. That represents the way life ought to be lived.
Juan, it all sounds good, except that damn Marlboro! But even now, eleven years after I stopped smoking, the idea of a cigar is appealing. The moon and the stars, though, clench the deal; I can live without the cigar as long as they are my company.
I like those moments, though most often finding them in the early morning in my backyard.
I rise at 3:40 every work day. Sounds early, but I go to bed at just after 8 pm.
When I rise, it’s fairly ritualistic. Review of emails. Then sitting at my couch, listening to ambient radio…it’s meditation time. And then the work begins.
But always, there’s the sitting in a backyard chair with a marlboro 72 cigarette and pen with pad at near 5 am. Sometimes it’s a star, and sometimes it’s the full, waxing or waning moon.