New Year Reflections
While the country ponders the next political moves its leadership will take, I'm considering a way to avoid putting off writing on a daily basis. I do not mean to write here each day but to write for my children and grandchildren.
The world has changed so much from the time when I was born. I'd like to explore that past and the people who populated my world as I grew. I also want to consider the lives of my grand parents who lived on the island of Puerto Rico without any of the benefits of modernity like running water and electricity. Their way of life had a positive impact on me because I visited then often and grew to value them and the land they farmed.
I think how hardy they must have been without the things we take for granted. I also think of the isolation my poor grandmother must have endured during the years she spent away from her nearest neighbors and family. Even then --early to mid 20th Century--the distinctions between living en el pueblo y en la finca were pronounced. While I live quietly on my own--without daily interactions with those whom I love --I do have these electronic devices which keep me in touch with the outer world. Now I am finding a need to protect the inner world of a writer so that I can write more frequently and productively.
So now I am working my way back to my inner world so that I can produce something for the family and friends I care about.
I know change and death are inevitable. I do however feel saddened by the destruction of some very good ways of being that modernity in all of its forms--good, bad, and vague--cause us to make choices. Unfortunately the choices leads to the loss of something that was good.
Now back to a Billy Collins Poem
The world has changed so much from the time when I was born. I'd like to explore that past and the people who populated my world as I grew. I also want to consider the lives of my grand parents who lived on the island of Puerto Rico without any of the benefits of modernity like running water and electricity. Their way of life had a positive impact on me because I visited then often and grew to value them and the land they farmed.
I think how hardy they must have been without the things we take for granted. I also think of the isolation my poor grandmother must have endured during the years she spent away from her nearest neighbors and family. Even then --early to mid 20th Century--the distinctions between living en el pueblo y en la finca were pronounced. While I live quietly on my own--without daily interactions with those whom I love --I do have these electronic devices which keep me in touch with the outer world. Now I am finding a need to protect the inner world of a writer so that I can write more frequently and productively.
So now I am working my way back to my inner world so that I can produce something for the family and friends I care about.
I know change and death are inevitable. I do however feel saddened by the destruction of some very good ways of being that modernity in all of its forms--good, bad, and vague--cause us to make choices. Unfortunately the choices leads to the loss of something that was good.
Now back to a Billy Collins Poem
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