Observing the Wind

An unusual gravity lives in my home office. It isn’t the friendly gravity that keeps us from floating off into space; it is a heavy, relentless force that makes the simple act of walking out the door or typing a sentence feel like trying to scale the smooth walls of a deep pit I’ve fallen into.

I tell myself, “I need to get back into daily writing and posting stories now that my website is complete.” But the notion cowers before the great gravitational force. I simply sit, staring at the screen while the cursor mocks me with its rhythmic judgment.

And then there is my wife, Becky.

While I am in here debating the gravitational constant of the universe, she is a study in perpetual motion. She wakes up knowing exactly what the day holds. It doesn’t matter if it’s Tuesday or Saturday—she has a rhythm. Laundry, vacuuming, dusting. I don’t even know half of what she does because she won’t let me help. She treats my time like a protected natural resource, clearing the decks so I can “do my writer stuff.”

I do try to make it up to her. I am always ready to take her to dinner to relieve her of the cooking and cleaning—a trade she rarely turns down.

I’ll ask her to come sit for a minute. She’ll pause, smile, and say, “I can give you five minutes, but then I have to move the towels over to the dryer,” or “I can sit for a while, but then I have to feed Max.” (Max being our 75-pound loving linebacker of a dog).

She is constantly sowing and reaping. I am constantly… thinking.

But to be fair to myself (something I am rarely good at), there is a difference between her work and mine. Her work is concrete. A basket of dirty clothes becomes a stack of clean, folded order.

The Laundry Room of the Mind

My mind, on the other hand, is the laundry room of a cruise ship. Imagine the logistics: on a typical day, passengers will send 9,000 shirts, pants, and unmentionables down from 600 cabins on board the massive ship, all churning in one giant drum. Miraculously, almost every item is returned to the rightful cabin in less than 48 hours.

My brain is like that drum, only on a rocking, listing steamer of the Eisenhower era. Thousands of thoughts, hundreds of topics—all agitated, rinsed, and tumbled together. And I am sitting in my chair, half-paralyzed trying to sort and fold them while the machine is still spinning.

The paralysis comes from the inspection. I’ll reach into the mental blur and pull out a thought.

Sometimes, I’ll discover the mental equivalent of a lone Argyle sock. But not just any sock—this one is made of the finest Scottish wool, woven into an intricate pattern that speaks of its pedigree. I know it’s valuable. I know it belongs in a story. But I can’t write it yet because I can’t find its mate. So I sit. And I watch. And I wait for the matching sock to tumble into view, terrified that if I look away, I’ll miss the connection.

The IKEA Paradox

Other times, I pull out some bizarre oddity that looks like it was randomly tossed into an IKEA box. The instructions identify it only as a “slorfloen.” Is it a critical locking pin that holds the universe together? Is it a piece of plastic trash I should throw away? I stare at it, turning it over in my hand, paralyzed by the fear of throwing out the one piece I actually need.

It becomes a fool’s quest. I get frustrated. I throw up my hands, mutter to myself, and walk out of the room—only to slip back in ten minutes later because I have to know where the slorfloen fits.

This is where the Bible steps in and reads my mail.

Watching the Clouds

Ecclesiastes 11:4: “He who observes the wind will not sow, and he who regards the clouds will not reap.”

For years, I thought this verse was about laziness. I finally realized it was about something closer to home—perfectionism. I don’t refuse to work; I refuse to begin.

For me, the obstacle is a blank screen. But maybe for you, it’s a difficult phone call you’ve been putting off, a business you’re scared to launch, or a conversation with your teenager you’re afraid to start. It’s a need to step into the Red Sea before expecting the waters to part.

Solomon knew that the wind is full of things—leaves, dust, clouds, maybe even a lost sock or two. You can spend your whole life analyzing the wind, trying to track every leaf, waiting for the conditions to be perfect. You can wait forever for the mate to that Scottish sock to show up. You can stare at the mysterious Scandinavian module until you go blind.

But if you do that, you will never plant a single seed or write a word.

Breaking the Gravity

The “Turn” came when I realized I have to trust the Master of the Laundry (and everything else). I have to trust that the mate will show up when it’s supposed to. I have to accept that some of what I write will be “slorfloens”—seemingly useless plastic nubs that I can edit out later.

So, I finally broke the gravity. I picked up my keyboard and started making notes. Like dropping seeds in a row, it was the beginning of something I would soon harvest.