Useful Habits

"Went out for a walk on a winter's day"...

I hum to myself as I pause to take that first measured inhale of crisp, cool air - the one that confuses your lungs no matter how many times you've done this. I step onto the familiar styrofoam squeaking of snow under foot and allow my feet to find their confidence on the well travelled and uneven path. California Dreamin' loops through my head - somewhere in the back left corner - as I walk towards the trees and the river. I made the fateful decision one morning to turn right, instead of left - and happily now have one less decision to make in my days. They say you only have so many decisions in you for any given day - and so, I am delighted when I stumble upon one that turns out well and settles into the space of a useful habit.

Like when I decided to try the Jerk Porkchops at my favourite restaurant - and then decided to do this every time I go - I consider this to be a useful habit. There is a clever little bit of nervous excitement that bubbles up when I am at a place and doing a thing that I know has brought me joy before because I also know that past behaviour does not predict future behaviour (someone they teach you about in philosophy class believed this) - and so, when I am doing a familiar thing - I am also holding this quote in my mind - somewhere around the top right edge of the inside of my skull. Then in one part of my being I am holding the memories of this thing and all the times it was truly a lovely thing - and in the other part of myself I am also holding the possibility that this will not turn out the same as before. And you see, that is the most exciting part! That is the infinite space between anticipation and reality - and in that space are all the possibilities!

And so, as I was saying earlier, I made the decision one day to turn right rather than left and now when I leave my house in the morning to go for a walk, I do not need to decide where to go. This leaves room for so many other things! Like when I'm at a place I've been before and I know what I'm going to order before we get there, but the person I'm with is not a person who has these useful habits like I do. So, they will sit and stare at the menu for a very long time and I will use this time to see the other things in this space that I haven't seen before - like the nervous way that couple talks because they are really spies and hoping that no one notices. Now, please don't assume that I don't try anything new.

I do truly love adventures and am very curious! I am also only one human living in this space that is the shape of me, and so it cannot be new all the time. You see, for me, the useful habits - like walking down the same path and ordering the Jerk Porkchops - these "predictables", if you will, these allow me the space to be curious in the way that does not work when my brain is "overstimulated". They used to say that about children when they would take them to loud places with lots of flashing lights - they would give them fizzy sodas and bubble gum - let them run around and make so many decisions. Then the parents would shake their heads and say "look, now he's all overstimulated"!

So yes, as I was saying - "walked into a church I passed along the way" was going on in the back left corner of my mind when I came to a decision in the path. Just before you get to the tree that is perfectly smooth on one side where a deer ate the bark away - before you get to that tree that is where the decision was. You can stay on the path - or, if you are feeling like maybe this would be a good spot to sit with your sweetheart and look at the river - if you happened to be thinking to yourself that you really would like to be doing the opposite of walking - this decision appears for you as if someone knew that this might be just the right spot to place a decision.

I feel that I would like to pause here - in case you have made a decision about me - in case you have decided that I am the predictable and boring type of person who walks on the same path everyday - I would like to stop you here for a moment. I feel I need to let you know I greatly enjoy seeing what people decide about me because it truly doesn't change me at all, and it is a secret they can keep just for themselves. I sometimes like to decide that the man who I meet on my walk every morning - the one who appears all bundled up against the cold - the one who walks out from where the old sanatorium used to be. I like to decide that this man in the blue jacket and beaver fur hat is actually a ghost! And maybe he hasn't realized it yet - or maybe he has - either way, he is enjoying the useful habit of his daily constitutional. Every morning when I see him on the path and make this decision about him, I get a little smile that goes up a bit more on the left side of my face. And when I pass him, he always sees this smile and smiles back. And we share this lovely moment in which we are both exactly what the other has decided we are AND both exactly as we are in our own realities! So yes, I am happy that by this point you have possibly made a decision about me!

Now, back to the decision that someone deposited on the path before the deer tree and after the garbage can - here you can continue to the right or you can go to the left and find the useful bench. Now the wonderful thing about having useful habits is that they don't require you to use the squishy part of your brain on the top left side very often (this part tires very easily and gets achy) - the wonderful thing about useful habits is that instead you begin to really notice when you are being given a little nudge - a tiny push from the universe to make a new decision. This is why when "I can see clearly now the rain has gone" begins to play in the back left side of my brain instead of "all the leaves are brown" - this is why when I heard that I knew that I should go left and visit that conveniently placed bench.

As I approached it, I could see that someone had made the decision to leave their notebook - or maybe forgot to make the decision to take it - either way, I decided to pick it up and see if I could find something about the person who left/forgot this book. I knew there might be some information inside because when I picked up this little black notebook, I knew it was one I had turned into a useful habit many years ago. Without needing to turn it over, I knew it would say Moleskin on the back, that when you moved the elastic, there would be a space inside the cover where maybe someone had written their name or a way to contact them if they lost this precious item (a very useful habit of mine). I also knew that when I moved the elastic over and opened the cover - oh! but you see! - I forgot about that insight that sits in the top right edge of the inside of my skull and the philosophy class - and so when I opened the cover and something red fluttered to the ground it truly gave me a little start as it was not what I was expecting!

I bent down to pick up the red paper and was curious to find that it was paper money of the kind exchanged for things, but a colour I didn't see often. Then, because I remembered this was not my notebook I was not as surprised to find handwriting inside that I did not recognize. I was however, surprised by the lovely little request: "take this paper money - if you use it well, you will never be thirsty - if you do not, this well will run dry." Hmm, curiouser and curiouser - someone wise said this once too. I then also noticed a small arrow at the bottom of the page and of course I obliged. Upon turning the page I saw one more request: "leave this notebook where you found it and you will never lose it - take it with you and it will never be found" - curiouser and curiouser indeed!

As I am not one to question the decisions of others, I placed the little black notebook back on the bench, folded the red paper money and put it into the pocket I have a useful habit of putting paper money into, and continued on my walk. Later that day I exchanged the red paper money for some flowers for my neighbours and treats for the couple who sit outside the store asking to relieve you of your heavy coin money. Oh, I imagine that maybe now you have made a new decision about me! Or maybe you are just curious about this new useful habit. I bet now you are very curious about how many times I have done this - how predictable am I with this useful habit - I can tell you that I was curious about this too and up to this morning I have repeated this very useful habit 400 times! That is $20,000 for those of you who are not familiar with our red paper money!

It makes me feel so bubbly to also know that I am a person you may make a decision about - we may smile at each other as we pass, and you will never know that I am smiling about this useful habit and this red paper money and this little secret that I have. When you see my smile that goes up a little bit more on the left side - you will not know that I am smiling because I made the decision to not be predictable and boring with this red paper money and that is my biggest secret. And the smaller secret that you won't know as we pass - the one that is layering a little flutter into my stomach along with the smile that goes up a little bit more on the left - the smaller secret is that I made the decision when I saw you on the path, just after I passed the deer tree, I made the decision to drop that piece of red paper money. And so when you see me smiling it is because I am in the time between setting the magic in motion and the magic being realized. This is my favourite place to be as it is a world of possibilities dancing in a space that appears predictable and boring.