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The way I am is this: I am a creature of habit. I am a lover of routine. The way I am is this: I am a delicate wine, designed to be drunk locally because I do not travel well.
The way I am defies description, as does the way you are. In our attempts to know each other, we are like the six blind men investigating an elephant. One describes her as a sturdy tree trunk because he's touching her leg. Another, holding her tail, describes her as a whip with a brush at the end. Another, stroking her long trunk, describes her as a large snake.
None of the blind men is wrong. Each is accurately describing what he is touching. But not one of them is telling us what an elephant really is.
So I can describe you as a warm and generous person, or her as a quick-silver mind, or him as a person of great depth of feeling. And I might be accurate for each of you, but I would not be complete. I can neither see nor comprehend the myriad other sides to you. We are all as multi-faceted as well-cut diamonds.
The way I am is hard to reveal not only because I am complex but also because I change continually. I can show you the way I am at this moment. Tomorrow I may be different. Yesterday I certainly was.
Perhaps it is my very reliance on routine that holds me together. Without routine my protean parts would fly from my soul like drops of water flying off a spinning umbrella.
So I'll welcome routine. For example, I'll willingly mark the arrival of summer every year by roasting half a ham and making a huge potato salad. We'll sit in the sun on our little deck and eat lazy summer lunches of ham and potato salad for a week to embrace the new season. This is my routine for greeting our
But wait! That's a lie. I'm telling you the way I once was, the routine I once had. But routines change. It's almost oxymoronic to think of it. If a routine changes, is it still a routine? My routine to welcome summer is now more along the lines of summer vegetables (eggplant, red peppers, tomatoes) grilled on my stove-top ridged grill-pan and dressed with beautifully green Spanish olive oil. I use the nightshades to celebrate the arrival of summer!
I eat nightshades in the bright light of the noon-day sun.
But this is just my current routine. It may change.
The way I am is the way the wind blows.
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