Echoes.

It’s that time of year again.
That time that tells us – no – COMMANDS us to step outside of our lives and do something for the good of other people.
Can you honestly say that this time of year doesn’t remind you of how selfish you are?  Of how ungrateful you can be for those luxuries that you take for granted?

I’ve spent the past few weekends driving.
Sure, there were purposes for the drives.
A wedding, a funeral, a friend.
Seems like I decided to combine the major events in life in under a month in order to keep my empathy abilities sharp.

I like to listen to audiobooks while I drive now.
I used to just sing – sing the entire way as though it were my own personal concert series of Lish songs.
But Nick was right – I do enjoy listening to the books… it doesn’t impede my imagination.

I only like the light, fluffy ones though – I don’t like reaching my destination and being unable to leave the car because I’m so caught up in my book.

This weekend I finished one and started another.
One that reminds me that I need to do things for other people AND myself… and the things that I do for myself need to mean more than a simple prize or quiet bath.

Nick said this weekend, as we were driving through the memorial park, that we only get one life.  He said this in a heavy tone of one who was just discovering this fact, though of course he knows otherwise.  Sometimes it just hits you as a revelation.
What we do now has to mean something – we can’t put things off – we don’t have more time.
We don’t have to watch this or that television show – I’ve never understood the people that can’t go a week without missing their favorite show or finishing that video game.
Our lives won’t change if we don’t know the ending!  It’ll simply bug us a bit.

But what’s wrong with being bugged a bit?

I know that doing something with my life means something different to me than it does to Nicholas.
I don’t need to be remembered for concrete things the way he does.
I want to be remembered for treating those around me well, for being the best darned mother I could be, for trying to do the right thing – even when it sucks, for playing a darned good Scrabble game, for loving more than makes sense, for giving, for working hard, for being the ear to listen, the shoulder to cry on.

After all, those are the things that matter to me in those around me.

I went into this Christmas season thinking that I was tired of the entitlement that everyone feels.
That I feel.  Abbey feels.  Nick feels. 
I wanted to do something for another family that didn’t have the opportunities I have, that didn’t have the luck that I have.

I didn’t quite make it.
The notions are good, the actions require a bit more soul searching.
I need to find the platform on which my line in the sand will be drawn.
Our Christmas traditions are changing – we’ll need to form our own as a family and even those that are in place will be changing… I’m not sure how I feel about any of that.
Change has always been a four letter word to me.

But I want to STAND for something.  And that growing needs rings in my head again and again.
I want to be more than this company around me.   A paycheck matters but at what cost?
It was always a means to an end – but something calls to me to aim a bit higher now.   Damn it.  I always did have awful vision for long distance and this particular target seems to be just hazy enough that I can’t identify it.

What do you do when you find yourself dissatisfied – not so much with yourself as a whole but with the direction your life is going?
How do you even open that up for conversation?  This need for change that you can’t even identify?
Or is it egocentric to even believe I SHOULD do more?  Perhaps I am simply a worker bee, sent to bring home the bacon and walk barefoot and pregnant while others are the torchbearers.

And.  How do you know the difference?