Productivity

Or the lack thereof. I'm just not feeling very productive today. And I'm not feeling very guilty about it either. It's not, of course, for lack of things to do. The dishwasher could be stuffed a little more and run, the laundry sorter's beginning to just morph into a laundry heap, recycling needs to go out, the stove needs cleaned in preparation for another bout of cold rain, spiderwort and lilies need planting, with so many cats there's always dusting to do. Then there are the things that don't have to be done, but should be: a draft of the column could be written, the refrigerator could be cleaned, the closets and cupboards could stand a spring weeding, the taxes need filed, the daybook transcription is languishing in ratty notepads, I could stand to get a little exercise and go for a walk.

Or, I could just lie here, watching the sun move across the floor, feeling a little hungry, but not motivated to do anything about it, and enjoy the cool, peaceful quiet. In twenty years, in fifty years, will I wish that I'd done more? Will I think, "My house could have been cleaner. I should have exercised more. I wish I'd had fewer weeds in the paving bricks out back." Are those the kinds of things I'll wish I'd done more of? Or will I think, "I'm glad I lay in the sunshine. I'm glad I took naps and noticed the peace in my life. I'm glad I read every day."

Why do we feel so driven to judge our lives by the way other people live theirs? (Although I suppose this is far better than judging other people's lives by the way we live ours....) I've clearly made decisions to avoid having other people's lives, so why do I occasionally feel like I should judge my life by those standards? My grandmother got up before dawn every morning, baked bread and pies, did laundry and hung it up to dry, packed lunches, prepped for dinner, cleaned floors by hand and went off to work, just to come home, fix dinner, wash all the dishes alone by hand, fall asleep working a crossword puzzle and go to bed, only to do it all over the next day. On her first day of retirement, she cleaned the furnace ducts. I don't think it made her happy. I don't think it even made her feel good about her life. In fact, I'm pretty sure that most days she felt sad or martyred. So why spend decades doing things just because other people expect you to?

Of course, somedays I think about her, and I feel bad - my flowerbeds are neglected, I don't have all my friends and family on index cards with notations of contact information and Christmas cards sent and received, and I frequently make cookies that are not uniform in size. Shirts in my closet (not ironed before they were put there) don't all face the same direction, the sheets occasionally smell a little musty because they spent the night in the washer, and I have blatantly ignored a cobweb by my desk for days. Would I be a better person somehow if my sweaters were ironed and organized by season? If my oatmeal raisin cookies didn't have a size deviation of more than one-quarter inch? If I had fewer cats and fewer books? And what kind of a "better" person would I be? Morally better? Spiritually better? What is "better" anyway? While I know a little organization and neatness soothes my soul, would I be happier? Or would I just be happier if I'd never been told that properly applied stamps had an equal border on the top and right side?

I suppose it's normal to question yourself, to question how you spend your time and your money and your energy, because that's what makes a person an individual, but at the end of the day, I feel comfortable just doing what I want to do in the moment. If I make myself do something, and later regret it, then those are two occasions of time lost, regrets felt. If I do what I want now, and later regret it, well, then, at least I have the comfort of having done what I felt like doing in the moment. The right to choose is about more than having or not having children - it's just that, the right to choose for yourself.

Recently, a retired college professor friend said to Andrew, "You're awfully busy doing all sorts of interesting things. Your house probably isn't really clean, is it?" Andrew told her that we do our best to keep it neat, but that yes, there's always some cleaning that needs done. Her response? "Good for you!" I just love that.

So, I suppose I'll go boil an egg for lunch, grab a book and some tea and maybe spend some time in a deck chair in the sun. Perhaps I'll need a few minutes of chanting, "That is not a standard by which I wish to judge my life. That is not a standard by which I wish to judge my life," but I think I'll manage to not to regret it.