RED ALERT

(I originally typed this on my Smith-Corona Galaxie II. I find writing in a medium that doesn’t allow for corrections to be really interesting, and I enjoy seeing what I come up with in that context. Here is something that just flowed out of my head one day last autumn.)

RED ALERT
November 15, 2018

Sipping tea. I sit here contemplating my existence. I enjoy the tap-tap-tap of the keys and the crisp type of the page. I treasure the tangible. The touchable. The real. I both long for a simpler, slower, less complicated time and revel in my ability to discover new friends quickly and easily across the globe, exchanging messages with semi-strangers with no delay and lengthening my list of people who are my favorites.

But sometimes I just want to put that all on hold, to pause the world and all that happens beyond my doorstep, and retreat into my smaller world of quiet and peace and slowness. I feel like I am getting lost in the larger world, as if I will never catch up with it all because there is just too much. Too much. How do I keep hold of my sanity? How do I find my peace without losing something equally precious? Connection. Connection with those I have found. With those who care about me. With those who help me support myself and my family.

I constantly feel as if I am at yellow alert, always vigilant, never able to just slow down. Or stop. I am always on duty. Always waiting for the moment, watching for the moment, that I must go on RED ALERT.

I carve out tiny recesses for myself. My books. My paper and pens. My typewriter. My old school technology. My analog life. But if I were to descend into it completely, I would lose the access to employment, friends, and modern-day fun. So, finding a balance is key. But, since there is literally more information out there than someone could consume in a lifetime, it requires boundaries, discipline, and vigilance to safeguard one’s time and sanity. I long to strip from my life the extra, the chaff, the superfluous. The problem is, sometimes the “chaff” turns out to be the “wheat”, so you must pay attention so as not to miss anything important, vital, that will lead you to new and worthwhile opportunity in the future. It is exhausting. Utterly exhausting. And I need a break. I need to get off this crazy ride. I need more boundaries. I need time to think. Time to breathe. Time to process. Time to regularly rediscover myself and share my best self with those that I love and the world.

I need a room, an office, a protected space of my own. But how? Where? I need quiet and undisturbed time. Even 25 square feet would do.