Paying Attention

I'm reading a book about paying attention. I read blogs about paying attention. I quit Facebook and Twitter so I would pay better attention. I write three pages every morning to pay attention. I'm typing this in order to pay attention.

Yet I can't seem to pay attention to much of anything right now.

There's the news onslaught, but that's pretty easy to dodge if I choose. I don't have to type nytimes.com, syracuse.com, or npr.org into my browser and they don't appear by magic. I don't listen to the radio and when I watch television it's usually something that I've cast to the screen. The news isn't robbing me of my attention.

My anxieties are. Things are all new. I'm home with my family (wonderful), working remotely (not wonderful), and worried about growing pandemic (really terrible). It's a lot of adjustment and so far I'm not doing great with it.

How about you?

It was nice outside today. I took my book and dog to the backyard. Groucho Marx wisely said that outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read. The dog, a terrible reader, chose to roll in the grass. I tried to read my book. It's a tough book and I'm in a tough spot, so it didn't go well. The dog probably could have done better. Maybe I should have rolled in the grass.

My mother says she's in the same boat (mostly about reading, not rolling in the grass). Stuck at home she's trying to read Richard Russo, an author whose books are easy to fall into, but she just can't seem to stay with it.

I suppose we should give ourselves time. It's still early days and though today's sky was blue it still felt as if it was falling.

It's good to remember that while today (Thursday) and Tuesday were terrible days for concentration and attention, Monday and Wednesday were better. Jon Anderson sings I get up, I get down and John Denver says some days are diamonds and some days are stone. Who am I to argue?

I'm sitting in bed typing this. The cat is purring. I'm tired. Once I've posted this I'll have no need to pay attention. I can let go and drift gently to sleep. Tomorrow will be another day, another chance to try my best to pay attention. That's about all I can ask of myself right now.