Dumbo’s Feather

I’ve gone and lost my lucky visor, the one that I wear during most races. The one that I don’t wash until after I’ve run whatever I’m training for and traces of salt outline its form, memories of  the miles I’ve run. I remember seeing it somewhere it didn’t belong a couple of weeks ago and thinking, “Why is that there? I’m never going to find it when I need it……….I’d better put it back in the car. Nah, I’ll remember where it is.” 

 The nasty visor and my steadfast belief that I have to run on the left when running with others betray a childhood mildy tinged with OCD….. faucets  checked time and again  before bed and teeth brushed beyond a reasonable doubt. Now I’ve got that nagging feeling that something is not quite right and I’ll have it until I find the damned visor.

It’s a silly visor and I’m probably going to die of skin cancer anyway, ( or one of the other multiple illness that I self diagnose on a daily basis. Occupational hazard I suppose. )

“Honey, I’m home.”

“How was your day?”

“Ah, well, I’ve got distal muscular dystrophy.”

“Okay love. Is that all?”

“Yeah, thanks. I’m going to bed now.”

Ridiculous, I know, but I believe in that visor. It’s a story I’ve told myself. I think, perhaps, that we are naught but stories, stories we’ve told to ourselves and stories others tell about us.

A couple of weeks ago I had a “problem”. Today I don’t even remember what it was, I only remember that it turned out to be okay and a longtime friend of mine grumbled at me, ” Everything always works out for you.” I remember thinking, “By god, she’s right” and “Is she SERIOUS??!!!”. When I look back at the series of events that I call “my life”, I see a series of stepping stones, each in of itself a tragedy and each a blessing. I lump related circumstances into discrete moments, artificial constructs with finite bounds not truly representing a continuum that must be by its nature indiscernible to one as limited  as myself. (Chapters, if you will, with a beginning and an end although life doesn’t work that way. You can’t finish the story, read the final chapter, and go about your business. Every story that you’ve ever told yourself shapes the story you are telling yourself at the present.) The stony side of the path is cliche to the point that I don’t write about it. Each stone too rough, too sharp, hard to the point of hurting but the stones strung together yield a lee in which I can tell the rest my story. In that windless place I tease words from the privilege, opportunity, and richness that life has offered me.

At least, that is what I tell myself.