8 Days To GO!!!!

Well, with the end of the Presidential elections looming, I have to say that I hoping I don't have to make good on my threat to move out of the Country if my candidate doesn't win. Why would I have to make good this time? Because, I have threatened to move the last two elections and still remain here! The only problem is, now that my investments are doing poorly (was that a toilet flush I heard?), I can't go anywhere - and I mean anywhere. In fact, my husband and youngest son are going to Manhattan over the Nevada Day weekend this year. Manhattan you say? Sounds pretty expensive to me! Oh no, Manhattan, Nevada - yes, the middle of Nevada between Austin and Tonopah. The town actually has 12 residents, a beautiful old courthouse, a bed & breakfast and losts of peace and quiet and open spaces to ride our motorcycles on. I'll be taking my pastels and a good book. I may even study my Italian in preparation for a test on the Monday after. I haven't picked up my art materials for probably, um, eight or nine years. My book choice will probably be Walden's Pond (annotated version), as I've already read it but I'm hoping the annotated version will explain some of the colloquialisms and details of Thoreau's life in Walden woods that he doesn't necessarily elaborate on. Life in the early Nineteenth Century was much more simple than the lives we live today and even though you would think a simpler way of life wouldn't need more explanation, it does for me! I love the book though and it is amazing how many topics Thoreau manages to address in such a short manuscript and how quickly and easily his thoughts roll out on paper in a cohesive and sometimes understated manner. Many of the points he makes about the way people choose to live their lives are pertinent to the way we live and don't live today. As I grow older, I truly believe simpler is better. Take only what you can give back. Pass through without a trace. The only true impact we have on this world is on the people and places that exist when we are actually here. What do we really know about the people who have passed before us, the people whose lives are spread out in the pages of history books? Can we say we know Abraham Lincoln, Mahatma Ghandi, Adolph Hitler? No, we only know of them. They are merely facts and photos on a page - they are not real. What we know are those who touch us while we are here and those who we touch. Once we are gone and once those who know us are gone, we are only stories and photos to those who can no longer touch us, see into our eyes, and hear our voices. History is impersonal and the reconstruction of it futile. We should learn from the Maasai warriors of Africa who live only in the moment and have no need for lamenting the past nor pondering the future. Many of us go through life trying to reconstruct the past, regretting our past and planning for the future. What happened to the "now?" I'm looking out my backyard window right now and marveling at the color of the trees in their splendid Fall regalia, while birds hop from limb to limb. Once in awhile I see a leaf give up the ghost and sail on it's last voyage as a passenger on the wind. I think that's what Fall is all about - showing us how beautiful the cycle of life really is. Sit back (preferably outside) and enjoy the season because like each of us, it will soon be gone as well.