Hello friends....just in case anyone cares, I apologize that it’s been over a month since my last posting. I got LOST. No really, I got LOST...through Netflix...and wow, just , wow. It started out as a simple time-killer on a lazy Monday evening. “I’ll just watch one episode to see what all the fuss was about,” I thought to myself. Well, holy shit. Now I know what it’s like to have an addiction....it’s been only a few weeks and I’ve watched 82 episodes....only 38 more to go now. I just can’t stop..The show reminds me a lot of my life...full of twists, turns, diverse characters, crazy coincidences and subplots...and 75% of the time I have no idea what the f*ck is going on, but it sure is entertaining to watch.
For those of you who didn’t watch the show, LOST is about a group of people who survive a plane crash and find themselves stranded on a remote island. As the show progresses “in the present” after the crash, the viewers are shown flash-backs in the past, as well as flash-forwards ,of individual character’s lives. As the plot goes along, we discover that various characters are related to each other in various ways without them even knowing. The show basically consists of a main plot, with a bunch of mini-sub plots squeezed in that all come together in the end. Each episode usually ends with a cliff-hanger that makes you go “what the???!!!”, and in my case, stay up way too late to watch the next episode to find out how the plot unfolds.
However, unlike the show, I can’t fast forward through the episodes of life or Wiki-pedia the things that aren’t quite meant for me to understand just yet. There’s no “spoiler” websites that tell me how one sub-plot of my life is related to another...I have to sit through life’s cliff hangers and sometimes wait until “after God’s messages” until it all starts to make more sense. More often than not, it’s really freakin’ annoying.
Like LOST, I spend a lot of time dwelling in the past or in the future. Which is a shame, because if I took more time to appreciate my present, I might find that I’m surrounded by a tropical paradise filled with ripe mangos and half-dressed men with sexy 5:00 shadows because heeey-oohhh razors got lost in the plane crash ....scccccoooore! (ok, leave me alone people, we’ve already established I like some scruff, ok?!) But nooo, screw the scruffy scenery, I’m always wanting to know “what happens next?” But, as soon as one story makes sense, I’m already on wanting to know about the next one. Oh, just like Oceanic Flight 816, I am such a wreck.
I’m learning how to take it all in stride....to enjoy each story while I wait for it all to make sense. I’ll admit, sometimes the waiting really sucks. But, I have to remember that it all will unfold in perfect time. I look back on past “chapters” in my life, and they ended up making sense in the long run, so I might as well trust that the future ones will too. Not all of the sub-stories were easy to go through at the time, but I know that they all were necessary to the big-picture story of my LOST life. For example, last year I was caught up in the stress of trying to find someplace to live. I had driven by this duplex many times on my way coming and going to the grocery store, and had always thought it looked like a neat place to live. However, around the time I initially found the place, the lease for my current apartment wasn’t up for another 3 months. But one day, on a whim, I decided to call anyway. The woman didn’t answer, so I gave it another few weeks...drove by again, saw the sign was still up, and called again. Still no answer, so I left a voicemail. A few days later, I tried calling again, and a very confused-sounding older woman picked up. She started spitting off some story about how she ‘didn’t know if the place was for rent anymore, because the woman that rented it was still there, but wouldn’t be anymore, but she was in Nova Scotia she thought but wasn’t sure, and her daughter was moving to Connecticut and Ellen was outside in her bathingsuit... but I could I come by and look at it over the weekend?’....the conversation made absolutely no sense to me. I was confused...but so was she, in a nice 86-year-old woman kind of way, so I figured the only way to get a clear grasp on the situation was to see it for myself. I went by, and lo and behold, the woman that was living there in the duplex had skipped town, gone MIA, and left all of her furniture (hence why the landlord was confused as to whether she should rent it out or not), but had finally made contact and agreed to be moved out in exactly...you guess it, two months...perrrrfect. Two months later, I moved in. And all ya’ll who know me know how much I love my landlord Randy, so it all worked out. She even takes care of my dog for me during the day. But, at the time when i didn’t know what was going on, damn, the possibility of being left high and dry and homeless was confusing and stressful. But had I known then what I know now, I wouldn’t had worried none now brah. It was all pre-planned by some script writer with a knack for intricate stories. Once again, the sub-plots worked together to make sense for me.
Not to get all bible-thumper on the situation, but one of the scriptures that sums it up for me best is this:”What father among you would hand his son a snake when he asks for a fish?...If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give to those who ask!”....Yea, touche Jesus, touche. I ask for a roof over my head and you give me damn paradise, with dog care included. And there I was worrying about how that cliff-hanger was going to work out for me...I’m an idiot. That God guy is a good story-teller, I’d join his circle time any day of the week.
So, yea...waiting sucks, but it happens, and all these sub-plots will work out once time passes. I just gotta remember that. Some days are easier than others. At the moment, I’m kind of sick of my current “plot” of working 8-5 at a job thats going to lead me to , well, um, yea, this exact same place in 15 years. But, again, that’s just a sub-plot of my life...I know I’ve gotta give it some time yet to see what other inter-woven sub plot it leads me to next. I’m not saying I’m going to spend my life waiting around for something to fall in my lap. When the time is right, inspiration will hit and I’ll take my cue from the director. But, in the meantime, I’m going to try to be more present in the present, let the current plot unfold, and not spend so much time flashing forwards or backwards. I mean, wow, look at all these mangoes!
Fruity as always,
Sara
