Writing Later Chapters

Thomas Merton struggled with the limits of his intellect.  He struggled with the limits of his faith.  He struggled with the limits of mortal life.

In a piece I read this morning (he wrote it in 1956) he mused on living his life as being the equivalent of writing a book he. Merton stated he did not want to write a book about everything.  Instead the devout man’s book was to be a book into which everything could go in.  His life was to contain everything that would fit.  The contents of his would come from everything around him.

Merton’s worlds are simple, but in their simplicity stand the most profound of commentary.  Sometimes I am regretful of things I have not done and achievements I had not attained. When I reflect in regret I am forgetting what my life actually contains. 

Each day as I set out to do my daily chores from cleaning up a stream of dried cat hork (this morning’s pile was a pretty accurate depiction of the Hawaiian Islands chain) to poking apart the lies that someone has constructed to tell a better story of their life to me, I am writing my book. Every person I call to say hello to is a paragraph on a page of my life.  Everything I learn about the heroin explosion in America from the book I am reading each night becomes part of my everything. Every time I clink a glass and say “slainte” another line writes itself.

My guess is here that I should be choosing my text carefully and doing it with clear vision.  My eyes should be open to all the wonders of daily life. My hope is that the remaining pages are rich and absorbing.