Where do you find inspiration?
There are no Inspirations-R-Us stores, or
inspiration.com but there is World
of Inspiration. Com. Click on it and
you will find wonderful quotes like the ones listed below.
“A champion is one who gets up when he can't.”
Jack Dempsey
“It's hard to beat a person who never gives up.”
Babe Ruth
The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.”
Thomas Paine
But what do I do at three in the morning when the world is
asleep and I don’t want to wake the cat?
I toss. I turn. I try to meditate.
I read. I turn out the light and
turn on my phone, I check my credit card balance. Facebook and email. Back on
with the lamp, I jot down my to-do list for what is already today. By four AM,
back off with the light, fluff my many pillows and cradle myself in their soft
intimacy.
The cat is awake and now he wants to knead his paws on my
cheek. I have to go to the bathroom, but I don’t want to interrupt his deep
concentration, but I have to go to the bathroom. He chirps in protest when I
throw him and the covers aside and crawl out of bed. My bones ache and my
eyesight needs time to adjust to the darkness, then I remember to open my eyes.
I will be seventy next year. Ten years ago, I slept like the
dead, no nighttime bathroom breaks, no creaking bones. At the age of sixty, I
thought I was old because I was sixty. After applying lip balm to my dry lips
and aloe to my flaking arms, I pad down the hall to the kitchen for a cold
drink of water.
Outside a full moon lights up the yard as if I’d left the
porch light burning. My neighbors’ barking dogs have grown hoarse, left their
posts, and gone to bed. The yucca’s fronds powered by the night breeze sweep
and sway as they cast ink-black starry shadows
across the cinderblock fence.
The house is full of the peace that arrives just before
dawn, the same serenity that stirs me awake, rested, wide-eyed and clear
headed. I curl up in the recliner, bare
feet tucked under me, and whatever energy primes the new day to begin, also injects
me with an intense passion.
Inspired by the quiet of the night and beauty of the golden lunar
orb, I power my laptop. My fingers dance and flit across the keys like
fireflies in the night, and my small world, illuminated only by the bight
screen, becomes alive and electric. My imaginings transform into words,
pattering down onto the electronic page. I wander and explore as I erect a new universe,
a new perception, or expose an old reality. The clicking keyboard, the only
sound, until daylight overcomes the moon’s glow.
For me, this is where the inspiration is. Inside, waiting
for the noise to hush and the actions to idle.
Where do you find your inspiration?
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