compline

i start a new job tomorrow. finally i'm a photographer by trade and not just in some part of my spirit. it's not an end point, but rather a starting point in the long road to supporting myself entirely through my creativity.

really, it's a beginning.

tonight i almost didn't make it out with a friend to st. mark's sunday compline. i had all these excuses about being tired and needing to prepare or unpack my books or whatever, but i'm glad they didn't end up getting in the way. i'm glad i went.
because if there's anything i need more in life, it's spending thirty minutes listening to amazing music in a cathedral with a room full of silent participants and devoting myself to not thinking. and even not congratulating myself for not thinking so successfully for 4.5 seconds, 5.2 seconds, 6.1 seconds, oh crap, i'm thinking again. return to beginning.

as we were driving home, he brought up a topic rolling around in his head through the service which is external versus internal destiny and how much we are subject to the myths we create for ourselves. so sharing compline stretched into sharing tea until way past my bedtime because i had lots and lots to say about all the destiny and personal myth tangents my mind had traveled along during the same thirty minutes when it wasn't supposed to be thinking.

it's late. after midnight. and some enthusiastic folk are singing happy birthday to someone and i need to get sleep for tomorrow so i'll summarize my thoughts on my destiny in a sentence:

i believe that i am heading in a very particular direction but that i will only arrive there when i am ready, which will probably be the point at which i let go of the destiny, the dream, and everything else attached.

this letting go is very hard for me. almost as much as not thinking.

okay, at least i know where my work is cut out for me.