December 12, 2023
Kind of scary. Thus starts my first Journal since 1982, I guess with the notable exception of my 2018 Vern’s Magical Mystery Tour blog detailing the events I experienced while traveling with my dog Teddi, in an homage to Steinbeck and Travels with Charlie. I retired in the late summer and I decided to write a blog (with the help of my niece Ara). That should count, too. A blog is a journal. At least it is to me.
Back to 1982. I was elected to the New Hampshire Legislature during my senior year of college just before I turned twenty-seven. My State and Local Government Professor assigned to me the task of keeping a journal in lieu of doing the prescribed course work for his senior level Political Science class. In fact, I'm currently copying it, an old red hard bound Record book that you used to be able to pick up in the college book store. Slowly, page by page, it is making its way onto my Kindle Scribe and I will be posting it here on Vern’s Magical Mystery Tour. But that is another story.
This new journal will be used for reflecting on a whole host of topics, sharing descriptive scenes about my encounters on my walks or my travels and for answering Stoic prompts. The cues are broken down into daily prompts arranged to fit a weekly Stoic exercise. I am using a book by Ryan Holiday called Daily Stoic Journal written and organized for this purpose. Part of the reason that I am journaling is my profound unsettled feeling regarding the state of the world. This may help me find inner clarity by defining that which I can control from that which is beyond my reach. I want to keep my end in mind and focus on this primary objective of Stoicism as taught by Epictetus and written about by Seneca and Marcus Aurelius (and others).
Why am I looking for clarity? Well, I guess we all strive to comprehend our world and seek equilibrium through reflection and introspection. Writing about it helps me.
A certain sense of urgency to get a better handle on my thoughts and commit them to prose moves me to navigate the way I am feeling about the world in 2024, writ large.
"So Foul a sky clears not without a storm." Shakespeare, King John.
A novel I am reading, On the Isle of Antioch, by Amin Malouf, opens with this quote. It sums up my mood. Don’t misunderstand. My mood is not dark. I am only in control of how I process the world, my examined perceptions; everything else is outside my control. I strive to give shape and definition to the process. Writing helps me to understand how I really feel (or at least how I feel in the moment).
December 13, 2023
Weather: Foggy, misty, rainy. 38 degrees.
Exercise: four mile walk to the causeway. The water is very high in the wetlands. There are still small birds traversing the bare branches. Things should be frozen and empty by now. I saw Sam Dicken and his mom Sandra on the way back. I always liked that kid. Colyn and he were friends through elementary school but lost touch in middle school.
Got my teeth cleaned at 8:00 AM, bright and early. Sure wish that I had discovered the use of a water pic earlier in my life. When I asked my grandmother what one piece of advice she would give to me about aging well, she was in her eighties at the time, she said, "Take care of your teeth."
Reflection
December 30, 2023
Weather: overcast, spitting snow, 34 degrees, light wind.
Exercise: walked four miles, fifth day this week. Hope I can keep up this pace throughout 2024.
Musing
Met a fellow on the trail today. His family lives across the street from where Summer Colley’s family lived. He runs the Colchester School District's food program. His team kept our Colchester school children fed during the pandemic. He says roughly 40% of the kids in the schools qualify for food assistance. Beginning last year all kids eat free irrespective of income. That is a good thing. They closed the snack aisles in the middle school, because kids spent their meal allowance on junk. Now, all the kids eat what is on the menu or, “fill in the blank.” Met he and his wife through their dog Charlie, a large 120 pound Something-a-Doodle. He's the only dog Teddi likes; unfortunately, Charlie passed in September. Charlie used to roll Teddi up like a cheap suit when she was a pup. She barely even notices any other dog. But this dog she fawned over like a little girl.
