I’ve always wondered about English Literature curricula. I dutifully swallowed stacks of Shakespeare shoved at me in high school. More like nibbled at the juicy bits if I’m honest.
I could recite the entire balcony soliloquy from Romeo and Juliet. But I couldn’t much relate to the two kids in the play. At best, my analysis described “two crazy kids overwhelmed by hormones from two families that didn’t get along and their story does not end well.”
I think about places where we so often have to be in life. Where we wait. Grocery stores. Banking machines. Doctor’s offices. Dentist’s offices. Just about any office associated with a medical practice.
Sometimes we know exactly what we are waiting for. At other times, it is a more vague kind of existential waiting or “I’ll know it when I see it” type of feeling. A generalized type of ennui.
Another confounding play we learned about in high school was Waiting for Godot. Two Italian guys keep holding themselves back instead of moving their adventures down the road because they are waiting for the selfsame Godot of the title, who never actually shows up.
The play is often interpreted as a depiction of the pointless, uneventful, and repetitive nature of modern life, which is often lived in anticipation of something which never materializes. That something is always just beyond the horizon, in the future, arriving ‘tomorrow’.
Well, now. Aren’t they a couple of cheery storylines to share with fragile young “chidults” which teenagers are? Their storylines are major buzzkills. These plays emerged from a time by writers who understood almost nothing promotes any certainty. Not love nor patience nor good deeds.
We are encouraged to “wait for absolution, or benefit, or reward or forgiveness.” The thing is if we don’t intervene and take active charge of our lives and the experiences we want to have in them, we are almost certainly going to be let down. And likely left out.
“Motion is lotion,” says my physical therapist, referring of course to the prescription for keeping joints limber. I would take that advice and apply it to all elements of life. Unless we are moving, we are stagnating. All fine and good if it is a temporary state of a few hours, even a few days. Both stasis and stagnation should be the breeding ground for devising your next move and for picking which direction you want to move in.
That direction should hold the promise of what you want to learn and how you want to spend your days. Want an education? Fill out an application form. Want to go on a date? Head to “target-rich” environments where there are other single people like you. Want to be rich? Study money. Watch how you spend it. Most important, clean up your relationship with money so it can be a good friend and not a constant torment.
Wait and see is a statement you can only make after you have planted the seeds or set something in motion. Then, and only then, should you settle back with a cup of coffee and wait for the phone to ring.
Expressive Compulsive 