Stepping Into 2014: What Can I Offer You?

Well, hello! Happy New Year! 
At a time when I'm conscious of being in transition, and also in a state of fragility and parlousness, my thoughts are all over the traditional questions--What should my intentions be? --What is truly my passion? --If I can ask the right questions, won't all the intentions finally stick? and finally, When push comes to shove, what do I really have to offer? --because of course I want to give.

I'm half a lifetime away from the sparky straight-A student who could generally assume her resume would fit her for any opportunity she might be interested in. And having maintained such diversified interests (read: not having settled down to any one thing) I find it too easy nowadays to assume that I can't do whatever occurs to my interest--because I lack relevant experience or skills, or because there's a flip side to whatever it is that I wouldn't want to deal with, or because I assume no one would give me a reference.

But one afternoon this week, a series of events and reflections showed me what I needed to know as a theme for this year.
Back in England, I bought a beautiful little inlayed box, miniature mosaic, the beautiful geometrics of Islamic art--from a thrift shop, for the equivalent of about three and a half dollars. I wanted it as a box for writerly inspiration, and just for its beauty. My mom's friend, who owns several such boxes, told me to be sure and varnish it; otherwise, the tiny mosaic tiles would start to fall out. 

So, I came back to AK, I settled in, it sat there. Phil loaned me two cans of varnish, one of them better than the other but he didn't know which, together with a few brushes. The box sat with my semi-unpacked luggage; the cans of varnish and the brushes sat in the back of my station wagon.

After a few days of this, on a day just above freezing with no snow in the air, I took the box, the brushes, and the cans of varnish, and slip-slid up the road to where a bench overlooks the bluff and the bay.

I could only get one of the cans open. 

Well, guess what? The can I could get open was better than the one I couldn't open.

 

I varnished the bottom of the box to make sure it wasn't some weird color, then started on the top. As I worked, I realized it wasn't shiny clean--that I was varnishing over some grime. How beautiful it might have been if I'd buffed it up pristine!

But I was varnishing it at all, rather than procrastinating the job--good enough.

It's not perfect. But now I have a beautiful box, whose tiles will not fall out, in which to store writing prompts, or pens, or love letters from the beyond, or whatever! And I returned the varnish and brushes to Phil right away, rather than driving them around for weeks without having used them.
Most of all, I had the lived experience that taking care of something then and there can be more perfect--and more empowering--than waiting to do that thing perfectly, and the exhilaration of seeing something through without inertia. 

And so, since then my email inbox has been emptied immediately rather than allowed to brim. Books and magazines are being read and returned/recycled steadily. 
And so, here's this post, still with my two blog urls, even though I don't yet have my website set up as I want it to be after an embarrassingly long time like that. Here's this story, even though the box is still drying and not yet brimming with great writing prompts or love letters from my favorite literary magazines.

As I embrace imperfection, I also feel a deeper assurance that I do have much to offer. Why would I write a blog at all if I didn't have anything to give? I certainly don't intend it as a narcissistic navel-gazing exercise. So, please keep me honest! Don't let me go there. 
Since my interests are various, "what I have to give" might be multifarious also. Which is against all marketing advice--I don't have a "brand" or any such thing. But for now, please let me give to you, and please let me know what I can give you.

Acceptance of imperfection, asking of myself what I have to give and where my true passion lies--realizing that these two things are one and the same--and creating an environment in motion where material does not accumulate or get stuck--these are the watchwords I bring to the new year. Hopefully this will also mean a more united and logical website situation. I'm looking for help. I'm looking to help.