My Dark Muse

Things have been looking up recently.  I feel like I am functioning at a higher level, and doing more of the daily tasks that are part of this domestic goddess gig.  Last week I had dinner made each night before the kids got home from school, so I would be able to focus on them while they were here.  And, the dinners were mostly new recipes--Thai, Indian, Moroccan.  Yummy stuff that I couldn't wait to make and eat and which required ingredients that were not a normal part of my list (fresh ginger root! eggplant! lentils and chickpeas, and garam masala).  Also, Sam and I got in more focused time to talk and learn and relate to each other.  It was good to reestablish connections and spend time on what is most important.

There are still bumps in the road.  Dorothea was 15 minutes late to ballet because my mind was elsewhere, and I didn't get in as much exercise as I'd have liked.  And this week, instead of making more fabulous recipes that I have gotten ingredients for, we've been eating the left overs of last week's meals.  Still, I feel slow, steady progress.

I noticed also that with my brighter outlook, increased energy and general increase in functioning, I haven't been feeling the need/desire to write as much.  This is not surprising.  Darkness of spirit has always seemed to inspire me to greater introspection and insight.  I think that is the way with many artists, too.  What is it about darkness that inspires?  Or is it a need to find something in the darkness, despite the darkness?  To discover or create light or meaning in the darkness?  There is certainly a poignancy of feeling that accompanies a subdued spirit which seems to bring sharpness and gravity to the living of life.  Little things become more meaningful, symbolic of the vastness that is within and without.  I have wondered if it is, in part, to give me time to be poetic and to see more, that the Lord has given me depression.  Only in the darkness do we see the stars and sense the enormity of space.  In the light, we tend to focus our own little world, living shallowly, one day at a time.

So, I am grateful for increased function.  I hope that continues and progresses.  There is so much I would like to accomplish in my one little day of life, with my children, for myself, for our family.  I am also aware, though, how this increased energy and function has had me bustling about dawn to dusk and longer, with little time for contemplation or appreciation.  I am striving for balance.