Life is Made of Chapters
Every year on Christmas Eve, Brad’s family gathers around the table at his aunt and uncle’s cozy Cambridge home for brunch. Every year it’s the same: mimosas, quiche, cheesy hash browns, buckwheat sausage, cinnamon rolls, and fruit. At the end of the meal, but before the table is cleared and the other holiday shenanigans begin, a candle is lit at the head of the table and a gratitude ceremony begins. Each member of the family has an antique candle holder at his or her place setting - a particular one that was assigned to them at birth or at marriage - and a flame is gradually passed around the table as each person shares the thing for which they are most grateful from the past year. Knowing this was coming, I was thinking a couple of days in advance about what I might share this year.
The thing for which I am most grateful this year, is the truth that our lives are made of chapters and not run-on sentences. Each day, each year we have the opportunity to mix things up, to change the rules, to redefine ourselves. Sometimes new chapters are joyful new beginnings that we have chosen for ourselves, sometimes they are winding paths of exploration with uncertain destinations, and sometimes they are forced upon us when a door has been unexpectedly closed in our faces.
The decisions we have made in the past, the ways in which we have interacted with our family or our society or our planet, and the rulers by which we have measured ourselves can be different today than they were yesterday.
Looking out, soaking in.
Drawing by Sara Pimental. Check out more of her work at sarapimental.com
I recently read Michelle Obama’s book Becoming, and my favorite take-away was something I read on the very first page:
“It’s one of the most useless questions an adult can ask a child - ‘what do you want to be when you grow up?’ - as if growing up is finite. as if at some point you become something and that’s the end.”
I love this, because even after checking the boxes and completing the expected steps of college, grad school, career, etc, I still find myself considering what I want to be when I grow up. The problem is that I want to be many things. And the things I want to be today are not necessarily the same things that I wanted to be 10 years ago. And that’s okay. Because we have the freedom and the capacity to change paths, scary though it may be.
I was listening to a podcast recently (Hidden Brain) about loss, and the human capacity to adapt to even the most extreme circumstances. The story was of a teenage girl who was a violin prodigy, studying many hours a day at Juilliard, and with renowned violinist Itzhak Perlman. While still in her teens, she suffered an injury to her hand which didn’t heal correctly, and she was never able to return to the violin. Although heartbreaking, this girl realized that beautiful music was not all she had to offer the world. She went on to earn a PhD in Cognitive Science, and became a senior adviser in the Obama White House, using her knowledge of human behavior to help form public policy. While her story is particularly remarkable, the truth is that “all of us have chapters in our lives that close, and when they do, especially if it’s one that we’ve known and loved a long time, it can feel like the whole book is over, like there’s nothing left to do.” But we underestimate our capacity to reinvent ourselves. The world is full of opportunities to use our skills and passion to make a positive difference in people’s lives. If you find yourself encountering an ending of some sort - whether it be a relationship, a job, a hobby, a thing you used to enjoy but find you no longer do - or if you are starting this year with new goals and dreams, I am confident that there is surely something new just around the corner.
There are new chapters to be written. And, as is the case with any self respecting novel, the next chapter will build on all the ones that have come before. It will add new pieces to the puzzle, bring new parts of the picture into focus. It will take all those skills you have acquired, all those lessons you have learned, all those failures and successes you have been through, and it will open doors to new things.
Let me leave you with a portion of a poem I discovered recently that I immediately loved. It gives perspective for when it feels like doors are closing all around you, because as long as you are breathing, there are pages of your life being written.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.
Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
the art of losing isn’t hard to master.
Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. NOne of these will bring disaster.
One Art
By Elizabeth Bishop
Whether it is a steady march in a singular direction, or a messy and unpredictable story, I hope you enjoy writing it.
Here’s to a life where the paths are many, and varied, and each wonderful in its own way.