EDLM day diary, January 3, 2021
This morning could have been many mornings from the past few months. Nothing different to do. Quarantining as much as possible. We’re healthy so it’s not a required quarantine, but staying in is safer.
I awake, by myself, just before 7:00 on the futon downstairs, a regular spot as my wife and I are trying to get better sleep. I don’t mind. It’s some much-needed alone time, too.
Unwelcome wake-up companions, a song and a senator I don’t like are in my head.
This day will be like most others recently: making art, playing guitar, a walk, some reading, defusing arguments between family members, dealing with a dog I wish we didn’t have (sorry dog).
A major argument over chores, tone, apologies given and not given, historical grievances between wife and daughter. I get dragged into it reluctantly, thinking with temporary envy of my brother who lives alone, in peace.
The trip to drop off the Christmas tree for recycling is a temporary escape but it doesn’t take long enough. Most of the lights I catch are green, speeding my return to a tension-filled house.
I’m learning to mix my own paint colors, working with only the primaries of blue, yellow, and red, plus a little white.
I play some guitar, an almost hourly occurrence these days. I’m making little short recordings that I hope to develop into larger pieces. It’s a 2021 goal.
I need to think about upcoming classes but I don’t want to. Work can wait.
The unnecessary morning tension has colored the day. It’s hard to let that sh*t go.
Small tasks feel like big accomplishments these days. I’m looking at you, coat closet with newly-cleaned up and organized scarves, hats, and gloves. Energy has to go somewhere, and quick, visible accomplishments feel real these days. So, I managed to wrench something positive out of the day, and my do those scarves look nice all hanging together.
I set out on a long walk around the White River, trying out the new path on the Muncie Central
High School side of the river. I like it. It’s not every day I get to see a new sight in Muncie. I’ll take it. That and the precious alone time. Passing by a friend’s house, I lament one of the losses of the year: my band. I look at the windows of the house we used to play in with sadness thinking that we’ll never do that again. That thought leads to other losses of the year – a long-standing friendship now reduced to the level of acquaintanceship and the distance that comes with that new status. The loss of a family friend, revelations of misdeeds long secret that shed new light on that friend and her husband, both dead within six weeks of each other. The loss of my classroom full of life and energy. All things considered, though, I’ve gotten off easy. Four plus miles later, I’m home.
My younger daughter, not involved in the morning tussle, wants to make breakfast for dinner. One nice thing about the stage of parenting I’m in is my children can now feed me, but diapering me is still a long way off. Cool.
This evening there’s time for sketchbook drawing. I’m trying to do more analog things this year and get more away from screens. Like the coat closet, a finished sketchbook page feels like a bigger accomplishment than it used to. Not bigger, exactly, but more real. I wonder if my daughters will keep these sketchbooks when I’m gone. Little windows into the mind of their dad.
One thing that keeps coming back to me these days is my movement away from words and meaning. Well, sort of. I can’t explain why drawn lines on a page, or lines of notes from my electric guitar, have more meaning to me than most things I can fully articulate in language. It’s like I’m more at home in the images of sound and vision than I am in narrative or argument. Maybe it’s a stage of life. I hope it stays. My journey into the mystic continues.