Please follow along with me here.
Imagine that "I" am your toddler "I DO IT!" son; your "You're not my Mommy!" step-child; your "Dad, you ruin EVERYTHING!" teenage daughter. "I" am a total pain in your ass, more often than not, but you still love "me", right?
Imagine that "I" am your best friend; your "soul mate"; your spouse. Sometimes, "my" quirks get under your skin, but you still love "me", right?
Imagine I'm your classmate; your co-worker; your teacher; your boss. There is plenty you don't know about "me" but we get along; we're sorta "friends", right?
Imagine I'm your sibling; your parent; your aunt/uncle/grandparent. We've had our differences throughout our lives, but you still love "me", right?
*****
Now imagine I'm no longer here. Or possibly never was.How would your life be different?
I'm not suggesting that I need to be George Bailey or Nic Cage's character, being shown a "glimpse" of some other life. I know I've recently requested a "do-over". That's not what this is about. Just imagine that I'm not here.
Would your "diet" be healthier or worse? Would you exercise more or less? Would you be sleeping more or less? With more or fewer partners? ;) Would you have the same pets, or none at all, or some that are completely different than the ones I brought into your life (assuming "I" brought an animal into your life)? Would you have tattoos? Piercings? Funky haircuts? Funky colors in your hair? Would you play more games or fewer, or different kinds of games? Would you watch more or less television? More or fewer movies? More or less Porn? ;) Would you be writing or painting or reading or sculpting or singing or knitting or crafting or dancing or working with wood or machines, more or less than you do now? Would you be doing the job that you currently do? Would you live in the same neighborhood? or town? or country? Would you travel more or less?
Think about these things, please. If enough people answer these questions honestly in the comments, then I'll give you my answers as a follow-up.
*****
For the record, I think I already live enough in "The Now" that I'm not really having an existential crisis. I had made a decision at the beginning of the year to blog daily, and recently, I've found that it wasn't the creative outlet (or PUSH) that I was expecting, so I opted to cease blogging daily. I think, since I made the decision to NOT blog daily, I have only NOT blogged on one day. That was the day that sent Lee over to another blog, because he was afraid I'd be gone forever. That was Lee, imagining that I'm No Longer Here! Being all prescient and shit; possibly foretelling of This Exact Post! Way to go, Lee!Ennyhoo. Please comment below. I'd love to hear your thoughts. Just pretend I'm not here. ;)
This is actually a question people don't like to think about. If "I' was my husband, I would be lost. Possibly curled in a ball forever. My house would be paid for, I would give away his dog I hate, I would sell and downsize my house, and I honesty, truly feel like I would never ever go on another date in my lifetime. He's a lot to live up to.
ReplyDeleteThose are certainly valid responses; what if he'd never been a part of your life? Would you have done other things differently?
DeleteLike, I know you're a Southern Girl at heart, but you're "from" DC. Did you meet Mr. in DC or SC? Would life be significantly different if you'd not met?
I suppose the biggest difference I can imagine for myself would be if my step-kid had never existed; would I have miscarried my own child, if we weren't dealing with the issues of her abuse? Heavy stuff, I know.
Thanks for answering.
HAHA, damn rights. I always enjoy being all pre...pesciewhatever...and being filled with MSG. Er, ESP I meant. Yeah!
ReplyDeleteSo you're asking us if YOU (emelle) weren't in our lives blogging away, what our lives would be like? I just want to make sure I'm getting that right. If not just let me know and I'll go from there.
But yeah, I already said before, if I hadn't read your blog I'd probably not be pushing myself a bit to do more walking. Oh I'd still be walking, but probably a lot less. Also, I'd be a lot more bored during my day. There's probably some other things too, maybe small things, that I can't think of right now. But you've made a small difference in my life anyway. And I appreciate it. :)
You're like one of my sisters. They're all older then me too. :D
No, my point was to imagine your life without someone who is Very Important in it. If your wife or your kids or your parents or WHOMEVER wasn't here, what would you be doing differently?
DeletePick an important person; imagine he/she is not here; answer the questions.
I appreciate that you feel I've had an impact on your life, Lee. I think I'm asking a bigger-picture line of questions, though.
Ok that's what I was wondering. Next time stop being so confusing. ;)
DeleteLet's see. I'll choose my older son (my wife would be too easy). If he wasn't in my life. Wow...just thinking about it is bringing me to tears. THANKS EMELLE! He's nine, almost ten now, and makes up jokes, and loves to draw just like me. He writes comic books and illustrates them. Most of the humor in them is whacky, but they still make us laugh because it shows how his mind is shaping. He is so very smart. And of course he loves superhero and Star Wars stuff as much as I do. Let’s see, how would my life be different? I probably wouldn’t laugh as much. He brings laughter into our life. I probably might not have our two cats. I may not have even had one cat. I finally convinced Teresa to get a cat (she used to hate them as she works in infectious diseases and see’s people come in with cat scratches that get infected…but now she loves her two pussy cats). Anyway, he helped me convince her, then when we went to see the 3 cats available, I wanted one, and my son wanted the other (the youngest at the time wasn’t really into the cats as much as he is now), and he pleaded to my wife to get the other one as well. So we may not have had 2 cats…maybe not even 1 if it hadn’t been for him. I wouldn’t have purchased a new art book and started drawing again (just a bit though, don’t always have time). I’m trying to think if we would have even moved outside the city had he not been around. Not that he convinced us, but if we only had one child we’d only need a 2 bedroom house so we may have moved into a different house outside the city, or just stayed in the city in a smaller home. We probably would have chosen different travel destinations before my youngest was born.
This is hard to think of things like that. My brain has to think back too much. STOP MAKING MY BRAIN WORK EMELLE!!! :)
Ok, that's all I can think of for now. I may post a bit more later. That's how my brain works. I don't think off the cuff. I'm introverted so I'll probably think about it for a while then when I'm doing something completely different things will come to me.
THIS. Yes, I am hoping to get people thinking about what they have in their lives. You chose to remove one son and found that your life was IMPROVED by his existence. That's nice. I was thinking about my step-kid yesterday and my resulting life was Incredibly Different (but hard to say if better or worse).
DeleteThanks for doing the exercise, Lee!