When a guy has posted on his blog for 1,795 consecutive days, some of those posts are going to be of higher quality than others.
Occasionally, in fact, the entire point of the post will be to keep the daily streak going, because after nearly five years the streak has taken on a life of its own.
It’s times like that when you might regret not having one of the guy’s books in your personal library, so you can find something he’s written that’s more interesting than “Wow, this is my 1,795th consecutive daily post.”
Yes, occasionally the only point of the post will be shameless self-promotion.
Will I still be here in 2045, when I am 92 years old? Who will I be then? A long-gone whispered once-upon-a-time, a feeble almost-there shell that once was a man, or (if I’m blessed) a vital old fart full of the beans?
Will I dare speak truth to power? (And what is power? Power is an arrogant fool who thinks he knows better than the rest of us. The truth is he is still an awkward child hoping that no one notices, just like the rest of us.)
Will I understand when I am 92, or will I be even more naive than I am today?
Someone wrote an article about how awful life will be in 2065, and I thought, “Well, at least I won’t see all of that.” I only know this window from 1953 to a time in the future that is nearer than ’53 is. How can I possibly understand the All of It when I have only experienced this sliver? I only know what I have seen, and much of what I think I know is what others have told me about what I did not witness.
Language is a miraculous invention that helps us imagine what it was like many years before us and what will be after we’re gone.
I made a career crafting sounds and then crafting words — always words and sounds and finding music in the words and words in the music, such are poems and songs and essays and stories all the same, this right here and this right now — and because of the recordings the words and music are likely to survive me.
It’s all ashes to ashes to ashes and dust to dust, but in between the ashes and the ashes, and in between the dust and the dust, so much life happens. We blossom and flower and fade, and spring comes to bring another season of life.
I emerge from the vision and wonder where all these words came from and was it truth I saw or just another hallucination? And I still don’t know where I will be, or what I will be, or who I will be, in 2045, or if my sentience will still animate this body and in whatever condition. I hope and I pray that I will have made a difference, although if I really hope and pray that, I’d best get on with the making.
A conclusion I keep coming back to is: I can’t change yesterday and, while I may have grandiose ideas about tomorrow, the only thing I can really affect is today, the here and now. And so I need every moment today to be a scream of consciousness. I need to “be here now.” I need my every waking moment to be a prayer: Lord, what would you have me do?
This musing brought me to Colossians, Chapter 3, which some texts title, “Put on the new self.”
“And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”
“Put on, then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience … and above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.”
These passages describe the “new man” that we are in Christ, and it’s a constant process that needs to be renewed every day. I was baptized into this new life 43 years ago, and I continue battling that old man every day, discovering every few days that the best path is seeking the peace of Christ but veering off that course anyway.
We like to believe that we are complex creatures, but we’re really pretty simple, seeking comfort and easy answers.
We like to believe answers have to be complex and can only be resolved after much study, but the answer is as simple as what Paul wrote to the Colossians — put on the new self and leave that old selfish brute behind.
It seems to be foreign to our nature; even after 43 years it can be a daily fight. The victory is only won through the grace of God, isn’t it?
