It's like Waiting for Godot....

…life is now. So why are we caught up occupying ourselves, we eat, sleep, converse, argue, sing, play games, exercise, swap hats, and contemplate suicide — anything to keep away from the now and to fiercely not give up on the dreams we have had etched into us since we were children. Our dreams may be quite different, but the waiting, the loss of time in this one life, is a disease of sorts and one I am full of, top to bottom. I shower, thinking about time as it ticks by and about what I will wear upon drying off ; I dress while imaging where I will be in an hour, and who it is I shall be seeing. I pour my coffee and rush to do the dishes, so that I can get into my car and not be late. Have I enjoyed any one of these pleasures?...not really, not at all in fact.

I think to myself each night as I collapse into my bed and turn off the light, how life will be better soon. How the life I have wished and dreamed of all these many years, will appear suddenly. I drive the familar roads and daydream about all theses visions created over time, and I have even spent almost two years writing a novel, which at the heart of it, I am again waiting, waiting for the imagined to become tangible, alive, an affirmation that I am not a failure, proof of it, and to finally exhale all of the years of the yearning.

Where have the years gone? It's like that drive we all take, when suddenly, we snap out of our thoughts and realize we have no idea how we just got from point A to point B, without any memory of it. We have been on auto-pilot. That can become a life...a life of auto-pilot, waiting for the man, the kids, the house, the career, the love, safety, strength, courage, the peace we may have never felt as a child. Everyone's waiting is different and made up of different fabric, but the threads the same, and the beating of our hearts, the same.

I have tasted my dreams, which have made waiting for them to show up again, in full blue ray,  high def-surround sound, all the more excruciating and numbing to endure. I catch glimpses of simple joys, certainly, many and every day; my kids laughter, the light streaming in and washing across my walls, my best friend as he smiles or the wind billowing my white cotton drapes. I do find the moments, but they are as difficult to cling to as a restless lover may be or a dream that you long to retell just minutes after waking. I am waiting, and in doing so, missing out on my life. I don't know yet or haven't found the balance perhaps of, not giving up the dream, while drinking in my life. For this moment, this is your life.

Even now, while I write, my head is ten paces ahead, wondering if it will be well received, liked, relatable. I rush to the Buddha’s side, beneath the Bodhi tree, begging for enlightenment. I have often said, contentment is a state I strive to attain, and yet it remains so allusive to me. I had taught yoga many years ago, played guitar, sang and performed, given birth three times, raised a family on my own and let love wash over me with lovers, music, nature, and yet, I wait, the one constant that never disappoints; never leaves my side, never changes. I wish for money as freedom, love as safety, beauty as power and praise. I wish to be thin, confident; all in the hopes of the perfectly imperfect marriage to arrive. Really, I mean it, perfectly imperfect, if you know what I mean. I am flawed, and I like that about me, and so I don’t want, nor do I expect something different from my husband. But there it is…something I don’t have and that I am waiting for.

All the things I fill in each day, just waiting for my life to arrive. I have no pithy ending here, no perfect lines to unravel. No sigh of satisfaction in my words. Oh, I do so love words though. Instead, I wait, and if I am really honest with you, with myself, really brave and raw; right now, I wait for you, the reader, to connect with me, reach out to me and make me feel not so alone in this world. Each day, each second that I am waiting for Godot, I wait for my death.