Minkgirl Muses

GRASS

"The grass is never greener," I started saying to myself while living in London. "There's no getting ahead," or "No matter where you go, there you are," might be other ways to say this, but I've been working hard for the past 18 months to cultivate a "glass half-full" outlook on life, so I'll stick with grass. Grass grows in the spring and summer - there's no denying it. Grass withers and dies in the fall and winter - that's true too. But millions of human energy hours are spent each year in the effort to alter this natural equation - to make the grass greener, to make it last longer, to make it plusher, softer, less likely to be nibbled by bugs.

We do the same things with our lives. We imagine that if we can just get concoct the right chemical formula and apply it liberally to the affected areas of our lives, that we will no longer suffer the indignities of the natural cycle - withering, loss, dryness, disintegration, stagnation, being trampled from time to time. What is a good life? All around me I see good-hearted people struggling with this question. The struggle has all kinds of flavors. In this version of my life, I've been given a scoop of quick-melting middle class topped with a scoop of long-lasting post-modern alienation. You might be holding a similar cone. If you are educated, if you have an active mind and a reasonably healthy body, if you have managed to meet your basic needs but still harbor some kind of ambition toward making/gathering/achieving more, then you are probably sharing my struggle. Maybe you are wrestling with your conscience - wondering how your craving for a Pottery Barn leather sofa can be reconciled with your desire to serve meals to the homeless more often at St. Anthony's Dining Room. Maybe you are wrestling with time - trying to "be present" all the time, while keeping your house clean, getting your work done, playing with your kids, and being available to family and friends. Maybe you are wrestling with money - trying to live within your means, save for a rainy day, enjoy the moment, prepare for the future. Maybe you are wrestling with all these things in a 24/7 winner-take-all, no-holds-barred, anything-goes, knock-down-drag-out, monster-truck-grudge-match of mythic proportions.

Maybe, like me, you are so fucking exhausted and bored of this struggle that you'd like to strip off your tattered lycra wrestling suit and run screaming and naked into the nearest lane of oncoming traffic - just for a change. I mean, jesus, what is going on here? Why is it so hard to sink our toes down into the earth and grow the way grass is meant to grow in the soil of this particular place. Why is it so hard to accept that in the natural life cycle there are productive times and fallow times, times full of lush greenness and times punctuated by the crackle and crunch of deadness under our feet. Why is it so hard to be still and resist the urge to struggle?

Be well.

Photo (Winter Grass) by Idle Type

Labels: Community Muses, time