Choices

I had lunch this week with a potential colleague.  Every such encounter offers me options, choices, if I allow them.  Every encounter with every person we meet offers options, choices as well.  Way open, way closed.  Options.  Choices.  A veritable cornucopia of possibilities.  Some of them are mine.

I have options

She said

Before she left my office

And moved out again

Into the world.

I have options too,

More than I have named

Until now.

Every choice I make

Opens up the possibility

Of something new.

I delight

In helping people

Find the connections

They need

To take their next steps,

To see

They have options

Like me

Like the woman

Who left my office

To move

Back out

Into the world.

Choice

It seems I must still practice making choices.  I know... I do it all the time.  Still, just like every single client I see as a priest, as a therapist, as a spiritual director, as a consultant, just like everyone else in the whole human family, I must practice making choices.  Even me.  Just like everyone else.

He wants to make sure

I know

This is all my choice,

My option to sit

Even dizzy

In the therapy chair.

My choice to sit.

My option

To close my eyes

Imagine what I need

To give words to,

Think of what I want

To keep to myself.

When I leave

It is even my option to see

The great blue heron

Or not

The great blue heron

Streaming just overhead

An exclamation point

In flight.

My option to receive the sign

Or not

My choice

To write

Even this.

Exercising options

Twenty-plus years... I am a slow study, it seems, at exercising options with my beloved*s extended family.  This year is different.  When my vision goes blurry, it is time to retire to my chair in the bedroom, close the door.  I will help with dinner, maybe read more of my book on listening, rather than expecting others to listen to me.  That is not the score for this week.  This week I can help with dinner.  There will be other times for other things.

I am exercising

Options.

The corner chair

In our bedroom

Is refuge

From the post-breakfast conversation

At 1:15 in the afternoon.

Twenty plus years:

I have finally learned

To exercise

Options.

Finally I have found the space

I can see

I can breathe.

I can help with dinner.

I can live in this space

For the time being,

Listen on the edges

To voices raised.

I can help with dinner.

New license to drive

Today I can drive.  I will most likely make the grocery store run this afternoon, drive to my volunteer job tomorrow morning.  By myself.  No radio.  Today, maybe all week, maybe all month, I will consider myself a new driver.  Learn again the privilege.  I hope I may not have to do this again.  This time around, I know there is the possibility that things might change... any minute. I hope not.

With this new year

Comes driving.

Today it*s not about

Speed,

But rather

A week or two

With new rules.

This week

When I drive

I will be the only one

In the car.

A week or two, perhaps three,

With different rules,

A new license

To drive.

New year.

New beginning.

This Sunday in church

We light the hope candle

On the Advent wreath.

Perhaps the new rules

Will last an entire season.

Perhaps

This time around

Things will be different.

I certainly hope so.

Front door

It seems we made a good door choice.  The installer approves.  Indeed, he more than approves... this morning he waxed poetic.  He made a point to remind us that it was our choice, and we had made a good choice.  More on the options theme... even in the choice of doors.

The new front door

Is in place,

The threshold

No longer cracked,

One more step taken

In home renovation.

It all began

With the bathroom upstairs.

Before that

The leak in the roof.

And now

The new red front door.

The door installer

Waxed poetic

About our choice

In doors.

We encounter poetry

Everywhere.

Toms

The kitchen renovation continues.  God willing, they will finish installing the cabinets today.  My beloved is set on a particular sink.  I care that water will run and whichever sink we end up with will work as a sink.  Thankfully, Tom, the design guy, is here to help.  He is one of the plethora of Toms involved in this process.  He is calm and centered.

The kitchen project continues

Interesting.

The workmen arrived

At 7:30.

They are all named

Tom.

The sink we wanted

Is backordered

In China,

So we look at

Alternative sinks.

More options

Always more options.

A plethora of options.

Meanwhile one of the Toms

Uses a power saw

In the kitchen.

It reverberates

Off the tile.

I contemplate,

As best as I am able,

The oatmeal at Starbucks

With all the fixings.

Options

There are still options to be exercised with the kitchen. I know there will be more options tomorrow.  Today the  kitchen cabinets are being installed.  Tomorrow they measure for countertops.  The cat is in the basement with his bed and food bowl and water dish... unhappy.  Today we have limited his options to make friends with the cabinet installers.  No one likes to have his/her/their/my options limited.

He*s been waiting

She*s been waiting

They*ve been waiting

Yes of course

 I*ve been waiting

To hear

There are options.

So often in conversation

In the counseling room,

The counseling arena,

I exercise options

Not in any

Therapeutic playbook.

I own many

Playbooks.

The options

A lot of the options

Are not written down

Anywhere.

Somethings

There does seem to be some sort of a plan. Darned if I can tell what it is.  This week*s somethings inform next week somethings. I have a strong sense that it all counts... all of it counts for something.

I know I*m looking for something.

Still

It keeps changing

Into a string of somethings,

A rainbow

Of somethings.

Last week*s somethings

Inform the ones

This week.

I find myself offering options

To clients

I had no idea about

Even the week before.

They thank me for options

I never even offered

In the first place.

Still

I know I am looking

For something,

So I can offer something

Even when it turns out

A complete mystery