I Feel

6:31 Sun not yet up. A nice dark feeling woods, still, with spots low to the ground and around the edges untouched by light. The eastern sky hovering between white and pink as the sun gets ready.

I sat down thinking “I need a procedures manual for my life.” You know you’re in trouble when you think something like that. And when your arms ache and you’ve got what feels like a toothache coming on, and this is what you write about first thing in the morning when you’re in your cabin looking out at a not yet bright day with thankfulness, watching your cat watching you through the window. The cat you wanted to boot in the butt for standing at the door indecisively even though he does it every morning, only squeezing through when you’ve grown impatient and let the door begin to close and at the last moment, with a quick whip of his tail, he makes up his mind, or whatever it is cats do. That’s about how I feel. Whatever it is that I do it is not the doing of a mind made up.

Oh, I know mornings, and feelings of inadequacy and questions of “am I doing the right thing,” and thoughts that get me out of bed even when I’d rather sleep in on mornings dark and cool. When the thoughts arrive I get up, feed the cats, wait at the door for Max, walk the fifty paces from door of house to door of cabin, watch the sky brighten and the trees gain distinction against the sky.

Oh, I know mornings, and feelings of adequacy too, and the messages that arise and the words that accompany them, the ones that aren’t strident, are often gentle, at times visionary. I pay attention.

This morning’s thought was, “I need to use the words “I feel” more often.” It seems like a message in between – not quite chastising, not quite gentle – but still revealing.

I feel: