Andrea began reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe to our kids this morning and my son, Ian, kept breaking out of the flow to ask Siri for the time.
“It’s 8:52am”
…
“It’s 9:07am”
…
“It’s 9:11am”
“Ian!? What is your deal? Do you have some kind of appointment?” He explained that today is Halloween and he was wondering how soon he could go trick-or-treating.
As luck would have it, my plans for the day offered their own distraction; we would go to the library. We’ve been doing this lately, mostly on weekends. It’s part of our routine: read (or be read to), workout, practice drawing or painting, play the ukulele or the guitar, and then go to the library. I’ve been trying to cultivate some good habits for both of us, all done for their own sake.
Ian loves the library. He begs and begs and begs, and I tell him not until all the other parts of our routine are done and then we head over to this third place where Ian immediately heads to the computers — we don’t play video games at home but I have decided that one hour of guilty pleasure1 Microsoft gaming is ok.
The library has monthly draws and it turns out that I had won two of them — an evening with author Emily Austin and a family day pass to the YMCA. At first I wasn’t sure that I wanted to spend our date night listening to someone talk about writing. Then I realized I watch YouTube clips about writing all the time, so why wouldn’t we go see an author in person?
In fact, just last night I had been watching this Taylor Tomlinson interview, which put me onto Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. I started reading it after we got back from the library, and this passage struck me just right:
“But I still encourage anyone who feels at all compelled to write to do so. I just try to warn people who hope to get published that publication is not all that it is cracked up to be. But writing is. Writing has so much to give, so much to teach, so many surprises. That thing you had to force yourself to do—the actual act of writing—turns out to be the best part. It’s like discovering that while you thought you needed the tea ceremony for the caffeine, what you really needed was the tea ceremony. The act of writing turns out to be its own reward.”
It makes me think about my day, the workout, the ukulele, even the hour of Ultimate Chicken Horse. I’ve begun to realize everything is a tea ceremony.
- My guilt; his pleasure[↩]