Choices ... in Blogisphere and the Real World

Years ago, fascinating about the daily paths taken, I wrote:

Choices

How did that honeysuckle get there?

In, amidst, and all around the azaleas.

The blooms of spring or the surprises of summer?

The one choking, the other standing firm.

I guess I’m not much of a gardener!

Gardeners, they all seem to know

Which to pull and which to let grow

On these the first days of Summer.

The little choices are the ones that fascinate me.

• What to say at a dinner table ... or after dinner?

• Which friend to connect with and which friendship to let wither on the vine?

• If I awake early, whether to get up or just to rest until necessary tasking calls? (like if Gunther Dog needs to pee or if I have an early visitor)

• Whether to write on a given day and what to write?

• If I disagree with someone, when and if to speak and when to avoid engagement ... to hold my piece?

Certain suffering people try to orchestrate all of these choice by turning them into mandates of what must and what must not be done ... kinda like the curses of the Five Books of Moses (well, at least the last four) ... Often these people are driven, it seems to me, by a general prohibition against pleasure. As if: 'If it's not pleasurable, I must do it; if it is, then I must not.'

Most of us have what some call faith. For me, faith is two-fold ... even here in the Fourth Quarter when the decision making apparatus has grown creaky ... like an old door that has been both used a lot and not used recently enough. Acting with faith is a multi-component matter.

It was years ago that I confronted the dilemma of the azaleas and the honeysuckle. I knew that there was a hierarchy of value in the garden ... and azaleas, for most gardeners, trump honeysuckle. I knew that if I didn't kill the honeysuckle, I'd be fighting to protect the azaleas right to exist as long as I was the owner of this property ... the temporary steward of this often-wild garden.

I knew that I wanted both the honeysuckle's wild but sweet blooms of June and the azaleas' more formal flourish around Mother's Day in these parts. Recognizing a wish is of some great importance and the rest of the "story" is irrelevant without the wish ... the spark .. the desire.

If I know that I want something, I have an equal desire that it not cause too much pain to myself OR to others. This is a tough one. It's been said by many in a variety of cultures and different words that any choice one makes opens certain windows and closes others. Angels, according to some traditions, are the manifestations of a God's will ... the words of His/Her mouth immediately produce a messenger, a cherub to carry out the mandate of those words. Angels have it easy; they got a letter from the boss! We mortals have conflicting wishes and our decisions impact the cone of possibilities that remain after our act. (If nothing else, I found the production of children came with such a lesson.) I have no druthers, in the end, but to choose.

Finally, I must act or, else, all is for show and naught ... and I must do so with a sense that I can and I will steward the outcome ... at least, while I have energy and breath to do so.

For me, none of this changes while Playing in the Last Quarter. Indeed, it's near that time of year to pull bushels and bushels of honeysuckle vine and to feed the azaleas ... ah! so that they, too, may live to fight another Spring.