Cash It In, If You Can...

The earth and sun and the planets are roughly 4.5 billion years old, give or take a couple hundred years.  The average lifespan of a person today is: 78.4 years.  So roughly, barring the freak accident, the unexpected stroke, murder or suicide, I have roughly 40 years left to live and learn and love, give or take a half-decade.

It's time to cash in the old dreams for something else, isn't it?  I thought about redemption today.  Why?  Who the hell knows?  (I have a boatload of useless questions streaming through my consciousness on any given day (you'd think I was a pot smoker or something, but alas, I am not - just a thinker)).  Anyway, I thought that there are days when I wake up (especially in the past couple of desperate years) and I think, "today is the day!  Today something is going to happen that makes it all mean something!  Today, at the very least, something will happen that will explain the constant question of why.  Why?  Why?" 

I do.  I look forward to the day because I think that maybe, somehow, maybe, I'll get an answer to the big questions.  The big, big questions.  The ones that need answering.  The ones that plague me.

And you know?  I read books.  A lot of books.  I am reading Madame Bovary right now.  A classic.  A classic for a very good reason.  Emma, the lead character, was so full of romantic ideals that she just didn't remain satisfied with her husband, she couldn't "fall into" a normal marriage, she was always searching for the illusion of what she had fantasized about, read about, wanted for her own life.  You know what I mean: the fairy-tale of all those romantic novels.  So, she sees, does not seek, but sees outside of her marriage and is given opportunities to play - and she chooses to play and, oh, is hit by the "ineffable seduction of her virtue." (my favorite line)  In essence, she decides to bang a guy that isn't her husband!  The second man she has committed adultery with!

Pretty juicy for a novel written in 1856, wouldn't you say?

She cashed it all in.  She did it, in spite of keeping her virtue, in spite of her face (she gave up the nose), but she, in one moment, cashed it all in.  Because she succumbed to her romantic ideals, she redeemed those ideals.  She found her own redemption!   Good, bad or indifferent, she did it.

On a very different level, I thought about cashing it all in.  Cashing in the dreams I had for my life and gaining pennies on the dollar.

What, seriously, do I have to cash in?  To take to Goodwill?  To drop off at the dump?  To lend? 

I have my romantic ideals.  I have the notion of what a good marriage is supposed to look like and what I got.  I have my guileless energy about how life is supposed to go.  I have this hurt.  I have this hurt that is so, viscerally, unimaginably, intolerably opposite of what I ever expected to be in my life.  And it is here.  On my shoulders and I am taking it along with me, and well, it's time to cash it in.

I'd love to say that I am going to quit my job, quit my life, sell my house, my belongings and become an exotic dancer (ha!  That's funny!) and live off the earth, but that won't happen.  Yet, man, my neck hurts every morning.  My shoulders ache.  My mind spins and spins and spins and...

4.5 billion years and I've spent 30 minutes writing about how disappointing life is: for me, and for Madame Bovary.

She dies in the end, you know?  She commits suicide.  A completely unromantic death...

(That ain't the way I'll ever go out.  And if that is ever deemed the cause of my death, then look into it, because I can tell you, it wasn't me!)

You can find your own redemption if you look.

Me?

I look to my family (though we're all in a big funnel of grief right now, though, I think, if we looked around, reached out a hand, we'd find a mate).  And I look to my kids.  They're amazing.  AMAZING.  I look to my friends.  I look to strangers.  I look to church.

On Sunday, the deacon, who baptized both Paige and Tony, picked on me because I found a typo in the Prayer of Reconciliation that they've been handing out to parishioners for the past ten years.  When I told him, pointed out the error (because it drives me crazy to see typos!), he said, "You would complain about that!"  I loved that.  I loved his humor.  I loved that he got me. 

And that is part of my redemption too.

I can't cash it all in.  I can't find enough to make it worthwhile, to make the effort worthwhile, but for some time, I can try.

Maybe throw in my self-pity, for say? A moment of grace.
How about a little jealousy?  For say? A moment of quiet.
What if I throw in some fear?  For say?  A hundred seconds of peaceful sleep.
Hell, let's throw in another bucket of fear for another hundred seconds of peaceful sleep.
Shall I throw in my anger?  Maybe I'll get a dozen smiles that are unexpected.
And regret?  What can I get for that? A few seconds, hell, a dozen minutes of joy!

Regret.  And anger. And fear.  And jealousy. And self-pity.

You cash enough of it all in and you might end up with some peace.  Some peace of mind.  Some idea of peace.  Some mornings without the sore neck or achy shoulders....

Yeah, one morning, that's all I want.  In the 40 years I have left on this 4.5 billion year old planet, I want a morning, while still in my 30's, to wake up without pain in my head, my neck, my shoulders and my heart...

Yeah... I know... 

I'll settle to wake without pain in the head, neck and shoulders...

my heart is too far-gone.