January is almost over and we’re now a month into 2007. I don’t know what’s been accomplished. Don’t Give Up has been on repeat all day and today’s one of the days when I’m just tempted to give up and find a way to either sleep for a week in hopes February will be better – even though I’m dreading February – or find an angle I haven’t tried before.
Because this one isn’t working.

The silence might be the part that’s killing me the most.

The silence is what I thought would help…except I don’t remember how this was supposed to help.

Don’t give up.

This weekend has been splendid and jam-packed with silence, feelings of solitude and insomnia. The happiest part of the weekend was probably trying to write out the 100 things post. It’s been keeping me…hopeful that tomorrow will always be better as long as I remain true to myself…I think.

Upcoming posts include the “Things To Do Before I Die”, “Things To Do Before 2008” (though one of my resolutions was to essentially try to live out 2007 as if it were my last year. I had forgotten that)...it’s really easy to forget sometimes…why is that? Is it because some things are just too big? Too vast and too abstract? Is it because I lack a specific piece of wiring?

I haven’t been living 2007 as I said I would. I’ve been running and I’ve been trying but I’ve been forgetting too many things. The whole point of living out the rest of the year as if it were my last is to embrace...myself. The person I really am and all the things that make me..me.

I have been listening to NPR’s This I Believe for over a year now and I’ve been trying to write out my own essay. It’s funny because I try to think of these cute stories and matters that make up my existence, but there is always something deeper to find, always a new moment of insight and belief. And so many moments of contradiction. What is it that is at our core? What is the magic that simultaneously defines us as individuals and that we affirm daily?

I believe in later. But I’m beginning to believe in the now. I’m beginning to see that it is all about the ripples that we create and the people we invite into our lives. I believe in the tiger cubs and the old man in China. I believe that the answers are easy and simple. That the execution is enormously difficult for the very same reason that the things we believe in are both so small (a short essay over feeding monkeys) and so very large and complex. If these things were easy, they wouldn’t be important. If these things felt so insurmountable, then we wouldn’t try. The cost and the investment needed is just right. It can’t be too easy, it can’t be hard…but it is always perfect if it’s worth it.

I believe in the marathon that makes you run an hour every day, that makes you run 5 miles every weekend...in order to allow you to run 26.2 miles in a day. I believe in friendships and connections that keep you going after your entire body is telling you to stop. I believe in hope that the person that matters the most will be there when you need them the most. And in the end, the marathon itself matters so little when you realize that the things that matter the most were the decisions, movements and people who were around you the entire time prior to that. And, in crossing the finish line, the people who are waiting for you.

So I will keep on running today. And I will live out the rest of the day as if it is the last January 29th that I will ever see again. And I will invite those worth inviting into my life.

Gambaro/Gambatte. And do nothing which is of no use.