Charles R. Hutson

     Started thinking about my writing again.  Even started writing again this morning about some of the stuff I’ve been thinking about, and as usual, I wonder why I bother.

    I think, or rather like to think that I am writing for someone who will see my writing some day and maybe take it to heart, maybe learn some lessons from what I have learned and maybe use those lessons to have a better life, even get a head start on learning what’s important in life.  Like I know.  Like I know something that is going to make a difference in some young person’s life down the road.  But I do I know that the chances of that are extremely slim of them meaning anything to anyone.  Slim to none as they say.  I’d have to be some kind of “important” person for any of my work to be published…and even more “important” for any of it to be read.  

     And maybe I like to think that my own kids or grand kids will read some of my writing some day and be moved to change their life for the better because of it.  But…I know that the odds of my writing lasting beyond my lifetime have the same odds…slim to none.  I can’t imagine my kids wanting to possess all the notebooks I have left behind.  There are probably hundreds of them by now.  I suppose its like books.  A person could take the time to read them like they do books.  I read a lot of books, and many people read a lot of books.  But they are about stories.  And they last a while, and then they are done.  And then you go on and read another book usually about something else.

     I was thinking…that my notebooks…are the story of my life.  MY life.  My whole life.  The writings were created during my entire adult life, but they also include memories of my childhood life.  Not a ton of childhood memories, but enough to make a story out of.  The rest of the notes are the actual story of my life…day to day…in real time…as it happened!  Tens of thousands of pages!  Hundred of notebooks!   And to be honest…a lot of it is pretty boring…but it is my life.  The story of my life!

     I think that I would like to put it into a book form, and maybe eliminate a lot of that boring stuff.  But I know I’m never going to do that.  And I know nobody else is going to to do that either, unless it came about somehow that I was an “important” person.  Then someone could take all those pages and make a book about it.  A book about my life.  The thing about me doing that myself, is that my life is still going.  I don’t have time to make a book about the Story of My Life from my notebooks, because I’m still living it.  And I myself don’t even feel its that important to make that kind of book happen because I’m not really even that important to myself?  Or maybe I just don’t want to spend the rest of my life living in my past life.

     Oh sure, I’ve learned things along the way that could be really helpful to people if they wanted to take the time to read about it.   Except that it appears everyone has to learn things about life for themselves!  And yes, I know that we do stop along the way and read some of the books that have been written by and about the great thinkers of history…and we learn  things from them that helps us understand why life is the way it is.  And maybe…maybe we adjust our actions according to what we have read and we actually have an improvement in our lives because of it.

     I heard some lyrics on the computer music in a song by Joni Mitchell.  It was something like…”they’re not gonna give peace a chance.  It was just a dream some of us had once upon a time.”  Don’t know if that’s exactly it but close enough.  You can look it up if you like.  Point is…when i was young, I actually believed we COULD have peace in our lifetime!  From my perspective, it seemed like the whole world was totally fed up with war and we were willing to have demonstrations and protest marches to make others more aware that there could be peace!  To quote another musician of our times, “All we are saying is give peace a chance.” 

     I’m sure Joni was much older when she wrote those lyrics.  Her idealism about such a thing had long since faded away…like mine.  I don’t remember what that song was about.  Maybe she was being idealistic about something a little less lofty of a vision.  The thing is, that I kinda remember myself when I began to believe that we were never, ever going to have peace.  Not just in our lifetime, but in a a thousand lifetimes.  Its just not going to happen.  Of course there are a lot of reasons, perhaps the main one being that we are all just too different from each other.  Our being different creates all the other reasons.

     That’s not what this blog is about though.  It’s about my notes…and me wondering what will happen to them when I die.  Or even before I die.  I have so many.  I think maybe I could fill up a four drawer file cabinet at least.  Four drawers!  Who of my children would want to take that on in their lives?  Even just to hold as a keepsake if not to have something done with them?  I think it would make a good psychological study at a university…hmmm.  And they may not even last that long.  Maybe my wife will want to get rid of them as soon as I pass.  The Story of My Life?  But what would that mean to her?  She has lived a good portion of that life with me.  Why would she want to know any more?

     So…will The Story of My Life…be gone when my life is gone?  I’ll never know, because I will be gone also.

Got to do something a little different today.  Can’t seem to feel what is the proper way for me to go.  Feel myself pulled in so many directions by things I would like to do…things I need to do…things I ought to do…and things I’d really like to do.

Of course, when such thoughts as those come to me, I think I would be best doing something that I would really like to do.  However…and there’s always a however in life as Frank and the Gang say…however, those other things still pull on me, especially with guilt.  Guilt!

Guilt.  Perhaps one of the strongest motivating factors in our lives.  Everything seems to be built around guilt.  This is not at all where I saw this going.  But then, maybe it is what I’m feeling…and coming here then is the true way to go for me at this point in time.

I want to do so much more!  But…I’m just not sure what is the most important thing to be doing.  I do like the idea of doing what I really would like to do because it seems there ought to be a point in our lives that we can do that without guilt.  But that is exactly what I feel!  I think I would really like to pick up my art supplies and doodle around with my colors and create another product that I like.  But…my guilt says that I am being frivolous with my time if I spend it playing with art!  That my art is “just” a leisure time activity that I should do after I am done with the more important things that I need to do with my time.

The thing is…what is the important thing that I should be doing?  I really don’t know.  It’s like one of those puzzles that keeps coming back around, going in circles.  And so…the guilt.  The guilt that I should not waste my time, but I don’t know that anything I do is NOT wasting my time!

Except for family time.  I don’t care what guilt says about time I spend with family…my inner self has determined that this is not negotiable.  Family time has been determined to be one of the most important things for me to do with my time…if not THE most important!

It’s just all those other things that I have a hard time qualifying.  Writing?  Reading?  Relaxing?  Doing art?  Community service?  What?  What? What is the most important thing for me to be doing with my time?

Occasionally, I can set the guilt inside and…not really make a solid decision, but make a strong enough rationalization about whatever it is to not be swayed by guilt.  Like the Blood Drive for instance.  I have made up my mind that it will have a priority…above many of the other things I want to do…at least for those few days a year that I spend on it.  I have told myself that yes, I can spare that much time to do a “good” for the community at large, and even for the world!  A Blood Drive is a good thing and there are few that will ever say differently.

Then again, some things are not so cut and dried.  Like art!  I personally think that this time I spend on helping to put together the art project here in town, is also a good thing for the community and the world!  The world need art!  And little towns like ours have very little to offer to our citizens in the way of art.  But…there are those who would argue about art…that it is not really important.

And reading!  Books!  I think books and reading are important as well.  And children!  God…I think that the serious education of children is sorely neglected by…by…by probably most of the people of the world.  God if only we could truly educate them…instead of just filling them with information…

But, that brings me back to me.  How shall I spend my time?  Today we will go to a visitation for a part of her family that we barely know.  But I say…that’s family whether we see them often or not.  Family.

And even as I sit here thinking about these things, I am more and more ready…to spend some of my time on art. I have an itch today to play with some of my colors.  So much that has come and gone in my head with artistic thoughts in my brain…and I have not indulged them for far too long…

Today…some art.  Not even gonna proofread…just hit publish…