When you have times where it seems to just stand still and you can just be.  Just be still like that time you thought was rushing over you like waves of the ocean.  That feeling of being under the water and looking up, holding your breath as waves sweep over your body and you sink further down.  Oddly in those moments of stillness and entrapment you can find calm and quiet.  Peace and safety.  And also let go.

I take appreciation of those moments.  Even if it’s a mere 2 hours to watch a movies or read a book or listen to music or just simply let my thumbs scroll over the lives of all those on social media that I see on a daily, hourly, minutely basis.  It’s however my brain feels in that moment and whatever it craves as a distraction from the reality of the grey gloom that has settled on this day and I let it happen.  I allow myself to settle too.

Seated with my feet curled up beside me on our grey couch, leggings on and my Notre Dame sweatshirt I sit flipping through Netflix until something tickles my fancy as they say. I chose a movie called Adult World with Emma Roberts, Evan Peters and John Cusack.  About Amy (Emma) who wants to become a famous poet and ends up realizing her dream may not be a reality.  Such is life.  The acting was good and the music too.  I could just be entertained and not have to think about it at all.  I thoroughly enjoyed that movie.  It was one I may actually purchase for my ever growing movie collection.

It seems to be the running theme these last couple years (perhaps even most of my life)……beautiful and easy distractions are necessary to survive this journey.  I have learned ways to do that even if it is just in a few hours by myself.  A movie, a book, a new album can be cherished more than a human sometimes.  It’s a longing just like love to me.  Entertain me and my saddened thoughts and warm my cold heart to remind me there is more to this life than childhood cancer, medication times and doctor visits with chemo protocols and testing and gobs of hand sanitizer and tiny bottle of Lysol to spray down my cart at Super Target before I touch it.  Happiness can be found before the credits end and the words The End show up on the last page and way back when, the record would stop, or the tape would pop that play button and then the CD would finish.  It’s all still there.  Ready at my disposal to use to my advantage anytime I require it.

Today it was movie, yesterday it was the music to and from school drop off and pick up that soothed me.  Day dreaming in the car can be touchy, so stay with it!!  DJ’s voices coming through the airwaves with jokes and new tunes to lose yourself in.  Pop music and classic rock seem to thrill the senses these days and keep my ass shakin’ around the kitchen as I clean up or cook dinner or fold clothes and make the beds.  The IPod carries the heavy burden of creating the perfect mood for the perfect mind escape as my thumb goes from A to B to C scrolling for the right artist to sing or play me into a fantastic spiral of emotional rescue through out the day or when the night is devoid of ease.

Take me away from the restless thoughts of the day and the cares and woes of the world and my reality.  Let me lose myself in you and your actors and your musicians and your poets and authors.  Entertainment is addictive and on purpose when it is a need in your daily routine to “relax”.  I don’t mind letting go when there’s something good to let go with.  Time is precious so it has to be worth it.  So that is why moments when granted like today in the slumber of winter cold and wet, I adore and relish in them and let myself feel the consciousness of that moment and dignify it with smiles and laughter and let it lead to this…..the tip tap of the keys beneath my fingers as the bubbles of the lava lamp keep time to the beat of the moment and the clock shows no fear in reminding me of my next endeavor.  Out the door soon but not with out my music and my memories and my imagination.  Cheers to the spectacular joys of the imagination and to the minds that can be so open as to let it unfold and stay seated for the full ride.

Exit to your left and pleas watch your step.  Ride again soon!!