Apr 15 2009
Feeding the Soul
Ever notice how boring most of your life is? I should say “my life,” since all I have to go on is my own experience. I suppose I’m just hoping I’m not alone in this.
You see, although I sometimes get a rush from some cool opportunity I receive, like the Amazon.com contest or other such things, for the most part my life runs on a sort of boring flatline… week after week of the same boring things to do: dishes, meals, vacuuming, sweeping, cleaning bathrooms once a week (hopefully!), carting kids everywhere, bookkeeping at the church, and the list drones on.
I have a list very like this one today, but it’s not really making me jump up and get to work. Perhaps that is why I’m writing this blog instead of starting in on the dishes. For the most part, I get up in the morning because I have kids to get ready, breakfast to make, babysitting to do (the kids I sit come around 7:30 a.m.), things to clean, etc.
But I do, on occasion, have real reasons to get up in the morning. I have plays that call to me, scenes that my mind works through while I am sleeping, dreams that lead to short stories, poems, or subplots… I have goals to get to, dreams of what I want to become, of what I want to do with my life. I know “doing dishes” isn’t what I plan to have carved into my tombstone. I want to make a difference.
I know I’ve written about this before, but perhaps this is my attempt to get myself going this morning–to do something real this week instead of just keeping my house clean. I have the morning off, sort of, since all the kids will be in school until nearly noon. Do I go to church and figure out quarterly taxes? Do I clean the toilets? Do I do dishes? Fold laundry? Sweep?
Or do I set all that aside and feed my soul a bit, revising a play or two, fixing a huge problem one of my readers discovered in the novel I turned in at Amazon.com? Do I tend to my soul today, or clean my kitchen?
By now I know the answer… do you? What will you choose today?






Ooh, ooh! Feed the soul! Feed the soul! Dishes’ll keep and, truth to tell, the good feeling from a little soul feeding can make the rest of the soul-stealing chores less onerous.
Okay, so I compromised…but I have everything cleared so that, once the kids are in bed (around 8 p.m.), I’ll have the rest of the evening…
I’ll make myself some tea, put on some beautiful music, and write, write, write until I fall asleep from the sheer perfection of it.
homework, homework, homework … my soul can get fed after April 23