“Why do you sit at home, writing this shit? Why aren’t you going to street fairs or raising dahlias or riding a mountain bike to the top of the world, around the lake and home again? That’s fun. This? This is nothing. You know, you never did learn French.”

True, we all need a push sometimes, but not doubt, thank you. Most times, I’m comfortable here at home, with and without my friends. I do whatever seems to be most important to me, even the laundry. That’s pathetic—but I’m getting used to it.

You see, I’m no longer young enough to try everything, but I’m old enough to try anything. I’m probably allergic to knitting, mysteries, gardening and most organized fun. I’m too old and too young for some things anymore: too old to pretend I like those things I really don’t; too young to stop trying new things, even if they might not work for me.

It’s a devilment of opposites. I long for structure and I love spontaneity. I’ve no need to be boxed in, but I build boxes faster than I know what to do with them. Anything and nothing goes—me, them, it, elsewhere and likewise. It’s art versus laundry—sure that’s an old and easy battle. But now it’s also art in laundry, and hell, just laundry. It’s my joy, my fantasy, my passion. And when the worm unwinds, it’s my loneliness.

The fretful details—the small steps that build all the Romes—send me running, fearful of futility, threatened by brittleness and loneliness. The details might want hours, days even. They might seize control and swallow up all my time and creative bandwidth. “Tidy up, pay the bills, read the mail.”

Some do these things well, with graceful routines that leave time for brandy and laughter. Some avoid them altogether. I desire both and do neither. When I finally turn to the ledger and account them their due, that’s when I notice false, brittle orderliness. Then that corner slips away to avalanche.

Of course it’s all perspective. The very grandest matters are just a series of small tasks that take attention, routine, method. Great thoughts and dreams require accounting and attention to detail. But when this starts to feel like a cog-in-the-works process, I sigh out precursor-despair. Tasks may be delicious, with their well-crossed lists. They may offer a place to hide. But whether I’ve embraced them as a hiding place or as tasks well-done, the insularity of small matters whimpers with interstitial
loneliness. “Can’t he kiss away the fearsome details?” Instead, the powder cloud swirls around me and I’m lost in it.

Someday they’ll find me out, those people who never knew to wonder, but suddenly do because they saw the feature expose. They had been busy grilling wienies and tossing softballs, riding their mountain bikes and digging their dahlias. They kayaked, spoke French and made love—or thought they did. They sang “Hallelujah” and crocheted potholders, never giving me a thought, I know. But now, they’re a little curious.

“Who does that?” they wonder, in that distract-able moment of our collective ADD. They didn’t understand why I sat at home, quietly minding my own business or why I looked wildly for my own business, again and again, in the comfort and newness of my middle-ages. They didn’t need to ponder why I had dressers with someone else’s crap still in them.

Who will reveal me? The hungry writer, hunting down one of those delicious stories of the weird—I mean everyman—crawling brilliantly through the wormhole of obscurity? Or is it the archeologist coming to rescue me from the avalanche of loneliness in small matters.

We rejoice in our liberation. We mourn the drowning of the oppressor armies sent to recapture us, just for a mite. We sit and recite the familiar stories and re-experience the events with our loved ones, our old friends, our new friends and the Stranger all over the world. We eat, we drink, we meet, we remember.

How might we offer a bit of patience to the simple son who asks—“what is this?” When we are children, this patience might seem impossible. Then we have children and undertake the task, learning the lessons all over again and for the first time, as we teach.

When we crawl out from our family’s protective shell we might be shocked at the many who have not yet encountered the measuring stick of Passover, or we might be those children ourselves. They do not even know how to ask—“what is this?” For them we must let this night flow full from our hearts so they can freely taste it and find inspiration in its universal and timeless message.

We redden with shame when we remember our disrespectful phase, so assertive in our alienation that we could not respect another’s devotion, caught in the cloak of the prideful wicked son. “What is this to you?” And so we own and enjoy our sentimentality, our traditionalism and even our sense of meaning. Perhaps we reach deep inside and out—to find love.

We are at our best, when we can—for a moment—suspend our judgments and be the wise sons and daughters who expand our table to include all these comers: the ignorant; the prideful; the uninformed and the stranger. Together we puzzle the days of our lives, and nights and days—or is it just the nights—reminded that to ponder, to wonder, to re-imagine and to offer time, food, laughter and acceptance, is answer enough.

Each spring we celebrate new-ness. We handle the egg, the lamb bone, and young greens. We identify with a new people, newly home in its new land, singing a new song and building a new life in freedom. We aspire to a world without bondage, joining hearts with those who suffer today. We long for so many freedoms: freedom from slavery; freedom from want; freedom from the tyrannies we impose upon each other and upon ourselves; freedom to celebrate a festival of freedom; freedom to be kind, to indulge, to listen, to love and to nurture; the freedom to know our own worth.

In the spirit of plunging forward towards a dream, I review the seeds I would nourish. I crave a place to be free from my quick complaint and criticism—slaveries I sometimes impose upon myself. In a tiny seed I might hear the wildest ravings of my heart; a freedom to yearn for the opportunity that may never be or the accomplishment that seems so unlikely. I won’t thin that start from my row of wishes. I’ll leave it grow a bit, meet the sun and hang from a stout stem although it drains away energy and looms a bit ridiculous. Perhaps it is impractical; maybe it’s even impossible.

How many weeks can it hang there before I begin to accommodate its awkwardness? They say it takes three weeks before habits are formed. Sometimes the body is faster still. Sometimes the mind is slow and heavy. When I’ve gone the three weeks, what should I do about this impossible bloom? Prune the bush and restore order? Or is there something that calls for my time, my thought, the air and the water? I’ve stepped out of my comfort zone, out of the invisible. I’ve written, edited, spoken, shouted, swirled and sung. The blossom is fine. Now, I’ll look again for the seed.

True, we all need a push sometimes, but not doubt, thank you. Most times, I’m comfortable here at home, with and without my friends. I do whatever seems to be most important to me, even the laundry. Shit—that’s pathetic—but I’m getting used to it.

You see, I’m no longer young enough to try everything, but I’m old enough to try anything. I’m probably allergic to knitting, mysteries, gardening and organized fun. I’m too old and too young for some things anymore: too old to pretend I like those things I really don’t; too young to stop trying new things, even if they might not work for me.

It’s a devilment of opposites. I long for structure and I love spontaneity. I’ve no need to be boxed in, but I build boxes faster than I know what to do with them. Anything and nothing goes—me, them, it, elsewhere and likewise. It’s art versus laundry—sure that’s an old and easy battle. But now it’s also art in laundry, and hell, just laundry. It’s my joy, my fantasy, my passion. And when the worm unwinds, it’s my loneliness.

The fretful details—the small steps that build all the Romes—send me running, fearful of cog-dom and futility, threatened by brittleness and loneliness. The details might want hours, days even. They might seize control and swallow up all my time and creative bandwidth. “Tidy up, pay the bills, read the mail.” Some do these things well, with graceful routines that leave time for brandy and laughter. Some avoid them altogether. I desire both and do neither. When I finally turn to the ledger and account them their due, that’s when I notice false, brittle orderliness. Then that corner slips away to avalanche.

Of course it’s all perspective. The very grandest matters are just a series of small tasks that take attention, routine, method. Great thoughts and dreams require accounting and attention to detail. But when this starts to feel like a cog-in-the-works process, I sigh out precursor-despair. Tasks may be delicious, with their well-crossed lists. They may offer a place to hide. But whether I’ve embraced them as a hiding place or as tasks well-done, the insularity of small matters whimpers with interstitial loneliness. “Can’t he kiss away the fearsome details?” Instead, the powder cloud swirls around me and I’m lost in it.

Someday they’ll find me out, those people who never knew to wonder, but suddenly do because they saw the feature expose. They had been busy grilling wienies and tossing softballs, riding their mountain bikes and digging their dahlias. They kayaked, spoke French and made love—or thought they did. They sang “Jesus, Hallelujah” and crocheted potholders, never giving me a thought, I know. But now, they’re a little curious. “Who does that?” they wonder, in that distract-able moment of our collective ADD.

They didn’t understand why I sat at home, quietly minding my own business or why I looked wildly for my own business, again and again, in the comfort and newness of my middle-ages. They didn’t need to ponder why I had dressers with someone else’s crap still in them.

Who will reveal me? The hungry writer, hunting down one of those delicious stories of the weird—I mean everyman–crawling brilliantly through the wormhole of obscurity? Or is it the archeologist coming to rescue me from the avalanche of loneliness in small matters.

And who will cover my ass? Frazzle, you little devil. Finding, minding, listing, insisting. I love you; now why can’t we just get along?

You and your obsessions, compulsions and fears—you keep me working and reworking it to death sometimes, chaining me to the computer screen just so you’ll know I’m hard at it. You’ve got me grinding away, afraid I’ll lose my nerve, my reserve, you fearful, frantic Frazzle.

You think I might just get lost in a sea of chocolate, red wine and New Yorker articles, a lazy day in bed, a gad about town. I bet you worry I’ll polish up my passport and forget to come home. You’re so jealous of all the things I might decide to do, sometimes you won’t even let me put away the dishes. Do you think I’ll be seduced by the dishwasher just to avoid writing? But that’s how it is with you, Frazzle. You control freak.

I know you mean well. You get the bills paid and help me find the desk beneath the rubble. You sort and stack little pots of this and that, all fluffed and alphabetized: get well; happy birthday; be on-time; connect the dots. You’ve got my backseat ready for anything that could arise today and then the next. Sometimes, my calendar jumps a whole week, I’m so damn prepared.

Thanks for your order-from-chaos, the full plate of work, a comprehensible accounting system. I do need you; I am thankful for the tasks you push me through.

And now Frazzle, having accorded you something of your due and thinking kindly on you, could I ask your favor in return? Please, lighten up. Let me slow, slip, tumble and squeak along the normal pleasures of the day, breathing a bit of air. Yes, I will respect you—dare I say expect you—in the morning. You’ll be waiting for me at four a.m.—the anxiety hour. But just now, let’s have us another glass of wine, why don’t we.

Days shorten and my blood cools down enough to stick to business. Morning clouds fix me to my chair and reward my hard work with afternoon sunshine. Evenings come earlier, the crickets are frantic and the air is stirred a bit serious. Summer still sparkles the corners of my mind. I can almost touch the fun, the folks, the picnics, the fresh fruits, veggies and the salty smells. But that serious wants more of me and I give in, almost relieved by the rhythm it suggests. Yes, I feel good doing my work and looking outside for a dog-day reward. If only the summer evenings would linger. What a pay-off—long slow light and frog songs on my deck. But the light has been narrowing since June now. I’m too late again. Next year I’ll pitch my offer in May—no, next year I won’t forget.

This new fall energy refreshes from the hot summer lazy’s. Too soon it will sag under the wet and gray-again days, then holiday-indulgence daze. But now it’s dry and green, mums-in-the-stores with notebook castanets snapping. It’s fall.

I’ll celebrate a new year of apple-sweetness and pumpkin festivals. Little wisps of summer will sneak through in golden light and red-hot grills. I’ll grab the warm teasing afternoon, knowing it might be the last. Days will speed their spin as the last drops of the year are sucked down the hole, fall and all.

Frazzle, you little devil you. Yes I’m talking to you. Why can’t we just get along?

You and your obsessions, compulsions and fears. You keep me working and reworking it to death sometimes. You chain me to the computer screen just so you know I’m hard at it—not even letting me get to the creative bit. That way you think I can’t wander off. You’ve got me grinding away, fearful that I might never write anything again, that I might lose my nerve to perform: fearful, frantic Frazzle.

Heavens, I might just get lost in a sea of chocolate, red wine and New Yorker articles, a lazy day in bed, a gad about town. I bet you worry I’ll polish up my passport and forget to come home. You’re so jealous of all the things I might decide to do. Really Frazzle, sometimes you won’t even let me put away the dishes. Do you think I’ll be seduced by the dishwasher and fill its pokey belly just to avoid writing? But that’s how it is with you, isn’t it Frazzle. Fess up. You’re a control freak.

I know you mean well, Frazzle. Your insistence gets the bills paid and helps me find the desk beneath the rubble. It sorts and stacks little pots of this and that, all fluffed and alphabetized: get well; happy birthday; be on-time; connect the dots. You’ve helped me prepare my backseat for all the events that could arise today and then the next. Sometimes, my calendar jumps a whole week I’m so damn prepared. Lists are magnificently checked.

Thanks for spots of order-from-chaos, the full plate of work, a comprehensible accounting system. You really do know how to do it Frazzle—whatever “it” is. Sincerely, I need you; I am thankful for the tasks you push me through.

And now Frazzle, having accorded you something of your due and thinking kindly on you, could I ask your favor in return? Please worry somewhat less. Let me slow, slip, tumble and squeak along the normal pleasures of the day. Let us breathe the air we’ve earned—together as colleagues—Frazzle. Yes, I will respect you—dare I say expect you—in the anxious rush of three a.m. But just now, let’s have us another glass of wine… and there’s that article on page 78….and we can go to town in our candy apple lipsticks. Oh please Frazzle? Just these next twenty times or so?