Day 12

Yesterday Bill poked his head in my room. "Your blog was good today."

I found myself once again seduced by the sweet siren call of praise, made all the sweeter because it was coming from Bill. Part of my affection for Bill lies in his tendency to deal more in honesty than in praise. I appreciate his tendency to reserve judgement: both good and bad. At the same time, I crave his approval.

So there it was, his approval. Laid out for me like a prize jewel. He said it was "good." I can do better, I thought. I immediately started to think about tomorrow's blog. What would I write about? I could feel the pressure mounting.

It reminded me of low-fat cheesecake. It was early in our relationship. I made a low-fat cheesecake that was, Bill said, "good." I was determined to make a better low-fat cheesecake. I swapped out regular cream cheese for yogurt and added sweetened condensed milk to make it creamier. I experimented with different kinds of springform pans and baking methods. I toyed with various toppings and add-ins. I must have made (and eaten) a hundred low-fat cheesecakes. I'm not sure any were better than the first. Somewhere along the way it stopped being fun. It was like racing to the top of a stairway to no where.

I could see that I was doing the same thing here, creating a competition that I couldn't win. I decided to table my blog idea until morning. I woke up this morning and starting searching my mind for something to write about: a weighty idea, one that would fall to the floor with a thud, something substantive, something real, something meaningful and profound.

I closed my eyes and all I could see were little bits of dust and lint floating around in the darkness, as if someone took a fluffy blanket from the dryer and shook it off inside my head. I heard the muse say, "Write about that. Write about the dust and lint in your head." My first thought was, ah, now she's mocking me.

Then I remembered laying on my back in the grass. I must have been 9 years old. It was a warm day in August. The sun was high up in the sky. I dared myself to look directly at it. Then I closed my eyes and watched the light show behind my eyelids: bright, swirling streams of light, shifting and moving. Slowly the light faded until there were only flecks of white, squiggles and bits of fluff floating in front of the inky backdrop inside my head. For a few moments, my mind seemed like a vast and inscrutable place and I felt connected to the mysteries of the universe.

I read an interview with Andrew Weil yesterday. He said that human beings need altered states of consciousness. When did I forget how to get there?