Posted 3/23/20
Happy Monday all!?!
(Second guessing, brain making grinding gear sounds)
(self-talk: “Uhhh…errrr….It is Monday, right??? Oh yes…church was–online three places–yesterday so it must be Monday.” )
(Scratching another hash on the prison wall days served tabulation).
Welcome back to the Digital Cornbread table, one and all! I trust and hope your weekend was good….. At least as it could be. 🙂 Today’s Shawshank quote-o-the-day is listed thusly:
“Get Busy Living, Or Get Busy Dying.”
https://screenrant.com/best-quotes-from-the-shawshank-redemption/
Sorry…there are some dirty words in this movie, including in the extended version of this clip. 🙁
Pretty pithy statement, but it is extremely relevant, especially these days. “Get Busy Living, Or Get Busy Dying.”
Busy is a funny little word, isn’t it? I dabbled with a little word study on the word and came back with:
busy (adj.)
Old English bisig “careful, anxious,” later “continually employed or occupied, in constant or energetic action” cognate with Old Dutch bezich, Low German besig, but having no known connection with any other Germanic or Indo-European language.
The notion of “anxiousness” has drained from the word since Middle English. Often in a bad sense in early Modern English, “prying, meddlesome, active in that which does not concern one” (preserved in busybody). The word was a euphemism for “sexually active” in 17c. Of telephone lines, 1884. Of display work, “excessively detailed, visually cluttered,” 1903.
“Getting busy” doing something implies to me in a modern, if slightly off-kilter, Ozarks context, to mean laying the foundation to do something and jumping in and doing it. If I “get busy” doing a puzzle, I clear the garage sale boxes off of the card table, clean said table (with one of the 1,000,000 wipes I hoarded…just kidding…I kinda wish I had…), dump out the pieces on the table and count them to be sure all of them are there, prop up the box so I can see the picture, and begin. I don’t prep, then stop. It is active, intentional, and, for me to do a puzzle these days, a serious task. (Why? Because I am too “busy”)
(Edit Note: Do as I say, not as I do.)
Time to potentially, accidentally rub some salt in wounds here with the hope it will entice some to act. (I am sorry, in advance, if I do.) It is very important to work. Very, very important! I get it. I worked nearly 100 hours last week alone due to my unique position, not including my writing. But, please, don’t let the busyness of living out the everyday business of life keep you from getting busy living. Just don’t! Work toward changing this trend. Get busy…becoming less busy so you can get busy living!
My mom and stepdad were both technically retired, but then got into home rentals. Those little money/busyness-making homes took waaaaay too much time for retirees to deal with and kept them from fishing more, walking/hiking more, camping more…in short, living more. I don’t resent them, even a little. They would say they were doing it to better our lives someday despite the fact that we all requested they worry about themselves instead of us. I just wish they would have spent themselves broke while they could…and would have gathered millions of joyous memories in the process.
But
they
delayed…
Then
it
happened.
Mom’s decline. Plans changed. Options squeezed. Brakes slammed. Busyness options narrowed to merely getting busy dying.
We all, as they say, have our own rows to hoe. I get it…I really do. But please, please get busy living…at least some. Find a way perhaps one Jenga game or picnic fishing trip at a time because, regardless how we plan, we will get busy dying sooner than later.
#EndALZ
Update: Mom is doing OK. It seems as though her stomach bug is better. I and my sister separately Facetimed mom today. I feel like she recognized my voice perhaps, but didn’t know well what was going on. I made some faces and she smiled. I talked about Barney Fife and she didn’t do much… It is not the same, but it was better than bad. My sister had a similar experience. It was worth the effort. We are working on a Facetime option for my stepdad, who is, shall we say, no fan of technology…but is a fan of mom. We shall see.
Our hospice nurse says mom is gaining weight and, more importantly, showing signs of edema (swelling). (Read @ here: Link Link Link ) This type and location of swelling, according to the nurse who has likely seen hundreds die, can be another sign that her end will be sooner than later. Her mom, my grandma, died of Alzheimer’s co-morbid with congestive heart failure, and that may also be a consideration as well. It is a terrible disease…it doesn’t need any mean little friends coming along as it does its damage 🙁
Couple little thoughts about the definitions above:
- “The notion of “anxiousness” has drained from the word since Middle English” Do we stay busy because of anxiousness more often than not? More jobs, more money= more peace, right? No. That shouldn’t be “drained” from the meaning at all. 😉
- Of telephone lines, 1884: Stupid phone keeps me and the family waaaaay to busy. 🙁
- Of display work, “excessively detailed, visually cluttered,” 1903: Oh, the busyness caused by our cluttered lives! 🙁 I have much work to do in this area…
Last apology, this piece…. If you just lost your job due to the CoronaVirus, this isn’t for you. However, when you get settled back in and things return to the new normal, don’t forget to “Get Busy Living, Or Get Busy Dying.”