Monday morning, sunny, I walked to the rock gardens again, like last week. I was later than usual – didn’t leave home till after eight – so instead of taking a flask, I went to the kiosk and bought tea and a bacon bap and took them to my favourite bench, passing the café on the way, and noticing that the doors were open, although I thought it wasn’t open until nine. Maybe it was special early opening for today. Still, I was okay in the garden. I’d also noticed, after I ordered tea, that the kiosk is run by a coffee shop I’ve been to a couple of times, so their coffee is probably decent coffee – normally I avoid buying it from the kiosks because I assume it will be instant. Of course, decaff is often instant anyway, but next time I go that way I’ll ask.
In the gardens I went to check on the fish in the pond. I saw the two big fellas – one black, one coppery – and looked out for the tadpoles clustering along the edge – there were still some, but not as many as before. I walked round to the other bit of the pond, below the waterfall, and saw a man holding a camera. I paused and realised why – I don’t remember there being a plastic heron over the other side of the pond before, and then it moved its head. The first time I saw the tadpoles, I remember being amazed by how many there were, and then thinking: ‘if a heron finds them, it could clear this lot’.
Something I was thinking of yesterday in the context of plans and failure was a story my therapist told me on Thursday, about a past client from years ago who, towards the end of her therapy, revealed something about her life that she hadn’t mentioned because, as the therapist said, it ‘didn’t fit in with the story’. I’ve been wondering what she meant by that: was it just to tell me that things can change, however stuck and entrenched they feel, or was she suggesting that I’m holding back something because it doesn’t fit my ‘story’, either from her or maybe from myself?
I haven’t expressed that very well, and now I can’t see the connections with the planning thing, though I’m sure there was one. If I keep writing, maybe it will come to me.
Then there was that quote about ‘living your way into a new kind of thinking…’ rather than ‘…thinking your way into a new kind of living…’ (I had to look it up again) which also seems relevant. That seems to me to put the emphasis on doing (living) rather than planning (thinking) – so that doing something – whether that be knitting or other crafts, writing, walking, gardening, even a jigsaw – is better for me than when I am thinking about what those actions are leading to, or how best to do them – which sounds either very profound or utterly banal.