Day One Hundred-Six: Too Much Input

After a very long 5 days without water and the only power via use of a generator, I was more than ready to reenter the modern world. I was in for an unpleasant surprise. Although I can never get too much of a long, sudsy shampoo under a steaming, hot shower, it's the rest of the modern world I found I could very well do without.

I have been less mobile than I like, as I am still recovering from my foot surgery. I have been restless for long walks in the fresh air. I get as far as the end of my driveway and my foot protests loudly. Thus, I am stuck inside. With the power use limited, I let the kids use the t.v for video games and movies. I have a stack of videos that I have been meaning to watch since about 2005, but I have not had the time nor opportunity to watch them in a house full of young boys. That left me reading quite a bit, working through puzzle books and reading the stacks of magazines I have around the house. I longed for the use of my computer. Who was on Facebook? How many e-mails did I have in my inbox? I was in withdrawal from my daily doses of HLN News, Oprah and the Weather Channel. I felt cut off from the world.

The world has come rushing back at a speed I didn't quite remember nor process. The reprieve from the modern world had been just long enough to get used to the lack of bombardment of audio-visual stimulation. Sensory input from every direction has left me with a slight headache and a longing to be cut off from the world again. HLN used to be where I turned for a quick review of the goings on around me. Now, between the chattering talking heads, the constant commercials and the stream of written information at the bottom of the screen, I feel motion sick watching it. I get the same feeling with my internet compulsion; I feel a bit nauseous from the lighting quick changes from image to image, email to email, screen to screen. It is like I am failing the world wide attention deficit disorder test. Funny, I never knew we were all taking it.

Because of my overwhelming sense of sensory overload, it has been a bit difficult to get back into the routine of writing. With some much information, stimulation and noise thrown at us, what could I possibly contribute? It is the the call to quiet, simple peace and quiet that I wish to contribute. The perfect storm of events- surgery, power outage, water shortage- has given me insight into the human need for quiet. I don't have much quiet in my life. I spend hours listening to rambunctious and sometimes overwrought boys. I fill the occasional silences in my home with music from my ipod or programming from my t.v., my car rides have voices from NPR and cd's that have just about been worn out from use after use, and when getting ready for bed, I fill my head with the narrative voice of the novel I'm reading. I rarely, if ever, just sit and listen to the silence.

How liberating to do just that. I resolve that once a day, for even a few moments, I will be still. I will not read, I will not listen to voices singing, talking, complaining, selling or whining. I will hear my own breathing, the settling of the house, the knock of the wind on the windows and I will be still. This is the best "kindness" I can do for myself- unplug and unwind. I am looking forward to what opens up to me during these moments of stillness. I'm sure that the universe will have something to teach me. I also sure that the universe will have something to teach you too if you chose to try it.