Sounds contradictory right? But that's the way it is with me.
Circumstances change with a person's age and other various conditions and considerations so in response, routines often change.
My latest is to wake up early on Sunday mornings, drive downtown, cross the bridge to the west side of town and enjoy breakfast from the deli offerings of a local grocery store .... bacon, sausage, fried diced potatoes, biscuits & gravy ..... while listening to the jazz radio station in the comfort of my car and their parking lot. Sometimes I'll drive the short distance to a local park where I used to lead a fall and spring youth soccer program and take in the ghosts, memories and flashbacks of those years.
It was long ago and yet much of it still feels so recent. Especially the chills of the end-of-the-day unwind moments after occasionally being out in the rain from sunrise to damn near sunset. 🤣
But I digress I suppose. I used to think it was my 'calling' .... to work with kids. To try to set an example. To do something that mattered.
I look around those fields and though the powerful images of those experiences survive, the soccer goals are no longer there. I know that when I finally walked away after maybe twenty-five years that there were budget concerns, but I never imagined that the program would vanish entirely from this spot. I always thought a way would be found to keep it going. That I might even return after a short period of retirement. It always seemed so vital to the youth and the community. I sincerely believed in the concepts it was built around. I truly thought that it and I were making a difference.
And though I had the thought I might return, the walking away was so difficult emotionally, I knew deep down that I never would.
I'm not good or accomplished at walking away from things.
It wasn't my intent to re-visit this memory when I started talking about routines, but here I am. It's typed and I'm not about to backspace and erase just to keep the thread consistent. 🤣
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