Cleaning Seeds

Purposefully waited to go outside till the sun was at it's cookingest in order to get a solid dose of Vitamin D in fifteen minutes. Messed around with the car by cleaning out the trunk, found things of use, no use, and now what. Pulled a few vigorous weeds, left the Queen Anne's lace to blossom later, and tossed the remaining bit of backseat birdseed into the field.

What is shame? It is what I feel when emptying the car of shoes needing repair, seven grocery sacks, cord, battery cables, plastic litter I pick up to recycle but rarely get to the bin; things to go to relatives, AmVets, or to school; the eight Halloween pumpkins I bought on sale to use for crayon holders in class, the saw I use to cut a real pumpkin in half, papers, car products, and paper towels. But who says I should feel guilty any louder than myself? Ah, friend, it is the voice in my head.

We all have one, unless we are crazy and maybe then have more than one or none at all. I often hear good things from people who have passed on, from people that love and care for me; these are blessings of daytime, these sudden thoughts in remembered voices. Go ahead, don't worry, it will all work out. Once, when making a left, something told me to swing the car as far out into the further lane as possible, just as the bus behind me surged forward out of his lane and winged my back quarter panel. A big, freaking bus, for heaven's sake.

But there are memories and intonations that are mean, impatient pushes in the center of the back designed to point out failings. Well, get out the bushel basket, cause I will not and particularly resent living up to expectations of the quibbling mind. Yet it's there, perfidious as a twisted foot. It ahems as I haul out the car, impatient, derisive, and look-at-you shocked.

This is nonsense and ticks me off to no end, this penny-pinched testimony to flaws; in protest I admire eccentricities of my own and others thus canceling out negativity by rebellion. If the voices didn't bitch so much, they would get better results, as I continually try new things just to be independent. For instance, this morning I tossed a handful of uncooked oatmeal in yoghurt with cashews for lunch. Not cooking oatmeal, what's the matter with you. Lazy. And yoghurt, what the hell is yoghurt? Why don't you blah blah and blah?

By lunchtime everything married and had kids together and it was delicious. A dab of agave syrup added sweetness. (Sugar! Why ya gotta put sugar on everything...)

This is what I tell myself, in my own voice: let's hang out the wash and forget the neighbors and get all extravagant with people, generous in compassion, lavish in forgiving our humble selves. We are in this together and cannot afford to let the cycle of self-punishment heap more sorrow on our weariness. Lift that head up and throw more birdseed out the car window as you drive around the city. I may be responsible for more flattened sparrows pecking at street seed than I care to know. Really, I don't do it in busy areas.

Self-judgement is necessary and important and isn't the whinnying of contempt brought on by shame. Reflection guides our way around the world safely, sanely, and allows the companionship of our loved ones inside our hearts because we deserve it surely as sunrise.

The planets do spin on, they even reburied Copernicus the other day, invited his old bones into the church for a proper burial after his heliocentric research got him condemned to hell in humiliation, back when the hierarchy said man was dictated by God as Center of the Universe, therefore the sun revolved around us'ns. Todays sun has spun itself down below horizon, and night has arrived.

You a good deed today, I can feel it. It's enough, important, and honest. Time to turn out lights, close doors, and climb in. It wouldn't be the same without you, dreamer of lifetimes, let a grateful head lay peacefully upon pillows safe as an aproned lap. Sleep well, sleep deeply. We are waiting, other side of the sun.