Enjoy the
View
“Like
tourists huffing and puffing to reach the peak, we forget the view on
the way up.”
Friedrich
Nietzsche
Nietzsche wrote, “Enjoy
life. This is not a dress rehearsal.” In my experience, this is
about the time of year we begin to speed up, and by New Year's, we're
swerving, and squealing on the curves. In our drive to do everything
on our list, purchase every perfect gift, create every delicious
morsel; in our quest for praise for our prescience, our mind-reading
abilities, and our endless pursuit of what is “just right,” we
arrive at year's end exhausted. We enjoy neither the mystical birth,
the season of light, nor the archetypal closing out of the year,
because our back and feet hurt from all that heavy huffing.
In my family, this was
the season for shaking the nut tree. Mother baked thousands of
fruitcake cookies, about a million apricot nectar cakes, and at
least, twenty pounds of fudge. She procured an expensive, live, “fat”
tree and decorated it so heavily you couldn't see the tree
anymore—and those darn, stringy icicles ended up on the floor, on
your clothes, in your bed, stuck to the bottoms of your shoes. There
were so many presents they filled up the space under the tree and
reached out like bright monsters to trip you at every turn. She
bought gallons of eggnog, which, quite honestly, no one on earth
should drink unless they're actively suicidal. It was the one time of
year that she could consume forty pounds of sugar in a two week
period and not feel guilty about it. Daddy just got drunk, and stayed
drunk. Merry Christmas! Happy New Year!
Don't do that to
yourself. Make this your mantra: “Keep it simple!” Every time you
feel yourself veering into the fast lane, pull back and remind
yourself that this is the year of your independence. You're not a
mindless sheep of the market-driven herd! Declare your personal
rebellion! Free yourself from conventions, blaze your own trail
through the tall weeds of commercialism! This is the year for
busting-up the establishment, breaking every tradition, seizing the
helm of your own ship! Join the revolution, and free yourself from
the tyranny of family expectations! And then...just go turn on the
oven, and dress the turkey.
No kidding, though. Keep
it simple. Enjoy the view on the way up. It'll make your descent a
whole lot easier. On January 2, nobody will remember what you nearly
killed yourself doing, anyway.
In the Spirit,
Jane
No comments:
Post a Comment