More than a year ago, I attended a production of Man of La Mancha. I’ve seen it in the movie version and have read the book, but this was my first time at a stage production of the work.
It still reverberates in me, after so many months. Besides the fine acting and a great story and a noticeable number of tears (my husband is such a softy), I was overwhelmed with such an appreciation for the positives in my life and the importance of giving them more attention than those moments when life is less than perfect.
The Spanish Inquisition is far more than just a bad day or even a rough year, but we all have difficult times when for some reason we get caught in a focus on the negative.
Don Quixote saw beauty in everything. And one can certainly argue that he might not have been carting around all of his brain cells or was perhaps in denial about what was really happening in his social circle, but one cannot refuse to acknowledge that what he saw was very much worth having be real.
We all need to seek the beauty even among the worst of times.
My daughter told me about something she saw just yesterday on her Facebook feed. I’m extensively paraphrasing (and probably getting a few details wrong. I didn’t see the actual feed).
Someday one will look back on the COVID-19 shut-in requirement. A parent was listing what they will remember about being stuck at home: bored children, limited food selection, the worry about if there would be enough toilet paper or perhaps if toilet paper makes a good soup.
The child listed what stood out to him: playing endless hours of hide and seek with that parent. Or it could have been playing living room baseball with dryer wool balls and the broken blind wand. I don’t recall the details.
The point was perspective. You see and you remember what you most looked for. What you anticipated you would get.
If I think I’m going to get nothing but bored, that my internet will fail once every hour, that the dog snoring was like having an unwelcome old man in the house for days on end… I’m going to have all those things.
But what if I am overjoyed that the internet worked at least 45 minutes out of every hour, plenty of time for an episode of my favorite sailing vlog, perhaps even two videos, and that the fifteen minutes without internet made it possible for my husband and I to discuss the whales feeding in the cold Pacific waters yards from the boat.
My dog Cagney gave me the perfect excuse to stand in the backyard and throw a tennis ball and watch her run delightedly after it, ears flapping, rear end slightly drifting to the left.
I’ve had time to think. To consider Don Quixote, my snoring dog, the lovely moments that come with talking to someone who thinks just like I do.
It’s not been easy to work from home. To think of all the ways we can avoid having to go to the store. How using one less square of toilet paper will reap dividends or at least clean those dividends later.
(Photo by Nadine Shaabana on Unsplash)
I’m going to keep my perspective oriented toward the positive.
The internet has been running over an hour now. The snoring has become a soft white noise. I had a whole pack of toilet paper in my classroom (the soft stuff for my students’ noses) which is now at home with us. We’re set for a least another two weeks.
Aw, life is grand in the old house tonight.
