Life Anew
Yesterday my life seemed through
Today I start my life anew!
I feel compelled to tell you this story, not because it is entirely novel; but because it is not! I am reasonably certain others have lived my tribulations. I am equally confident others will find themselves in a similar plight in the future. Perhaps it is this latter belief that spurs me to tell you my story. I am betting you can identify with me!
It all started quite by accident. I had been invited to a picnic. At first I was not inclined to attend. Then the day turned out so nice I decided "what the heck" I might as well go. It was not as though I had something else pressing at the time.
The question, by an attractive young woman, was harmless enough. "What do you do, Mr. Donnelly?"
"I'm retired," I heard myself answering automatically.
"That's nice," she said smiling pleasantly.
Suddenly I didn't like my answer at all! I felt like a second class citizen!
"What did you do before that?" she inquired.
"I was an architect," I said with a lot more pride.
"Oh!" she exclaimed, "that's a great career!"
"I always enjoyed it," I readily admitted.
"It must be so exciting to see your ideas take tangible form!"
"That's true...and a little scary too, I might add!" We both laughed.
"It was nice meeting you, Mr. Donnelly," she said as she shook my hand and drifted away into the growing crowd of picnickers.
That whole conversation got me thinking about my life; where it had been, where it was now,...and especially about where it was going.
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I lived a wonder-full childhood. I remember, as though it were only yesterday, the first time I saw an owl, watching leaves fall in the Autumn only to see them mysteriously reappear again in the Spring, the first time a puppy kissed me.
Then suddenly I began growing up. Frankly, I was not at all that thrilled with the concept. I had, of course, reluctantly to go along with it anyway. The price I paid was considerable. Let me give you an example. I got married...because I fell in love with the concept of love. If that isn't ridiculous! But that perhaps is the price idealists have always paid,...more often than not willingly. And so I was obliged to admit my own humanity. It hurt. And then I was done with it. Divorce. I was forced to start again. I really didn't mind.
There was an immediate feeling of exhilaration. It was as though everything before was really only a warmup. It all fit together nicely. It was as if there would be the inevitable "they all lived happily ever after."
However, there are such things as automobile accidents. Nobody's fault...but death, nonetheless. I was left bereft of hope. Then somehow I was able to reach inside to that hidden reservoir of resolve which makes everything seem possible, and my life was in high gear again.
Then somehow it began slipping away. Age has that capacity of being able to steal things most prized when we are most vulnerable (and least aware of our vulnerability.) And so it was that, as a I approached my seventieth birthday, I fell into the most acute depression--the feeling that I was entirely powerless to influence my own destiny, least of all the future of humankind.
I began drifting in a way I had never done, either as a child, or as an adult. It was painful to confront each day.
I began going through life as if I were programmed. It was as if I was expected to make a certain response to some pre-determined stimulus. I recoiled.
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What that young woman said shook me out of my lethargy.
"I'm retiring from retirement," I heard myself saying out loud. I looked around embarrassed; hoping no one had heard me. They hadn't. "I was an architect once and I can be an architect again! I'll start my own little architectural consulting firm. Kind of freelance architecture," I mused to myself..."I like it."
The young man did a nice job of painting the name on the glass door: Harold H. Donnelly, Architectural Consultant. I sat down in my friendly old swivel chair and wondered if anyone in the world would come to see me. I didn't care really. I was having fun again...and I didn't desperately need the money.
The knock was so soft I thought I was hearing things. Then it came again. I almost jumped out of my chair. Composing myself, I opened the door and met a self conscious smile. "Mr. Donnelly?" came a hesitant query.
It was a young man named Mathew Judson.
"This is kind of far out," Matt paused. "I'm trying to get our Town Council to put in planters and memorial benches in the downtown area. It is a dream my Father had and I'd like to see it through to completion. I need someone to design them, but, unfortunately, I don't have any money for the project. It's sort of a `labor of love'...if you know what I mean," his voice trailed off into a whisper.
"Great!" I heard myself exclaiming with an enthusiasm I thought I'd somehow lost along life's way.
"You mean, you'll do it...for nothing?" he asked in a voice suffused with disbelief.
"Sure," I said, "let's get started..time's a wastin'!"
My next client was a young couple who wanted to remodel an older house...and "wanted to do it right." They could "only pay five hundred dollars." Little did they realize that was a 500% increase over my previous job!
I was leaning over my drafting table, now freshly dusted and reassuringly cluttered, when I came to the startling revelation that I was an architect in more than one regard. To be sure, I could design buildings, but I was also the architect of my life! Furthermore, I had the giddy feeling that I was now suddenly embarked upon perhaps the most mean-ingful chapter in my entire life. I started singing a silly little ditty: "Yesterday my life seemed through; today I start my..."