Tap, Tap, Tap

My youngest son played the part of a pharmacist the other night at the concluding ceremony after his three-week internship at the UCSF medical school.

Summer is a time when you try to expose your teenaged kids to as many useful experiences and people as possible. My son is one of 19 kids who were accepted into the program at UCSF, and although he occasionally grumbled about having to get up early, I could tell the substance of the course (all things medical) did interest him greatly.

He's a naturally cerebral, curious guy, who reads widely and and constantly about all sorts of topics. A career in the academy and/or science might make sense; in medicine perhaps also. His main medical-related subject of interest seems to be psychology at this point.

***

The kids are going off for the weekend with their Mom, so what normally would be a busy Saturday today has become a quiet day, unfilled with obligations. The only errand on my list I've already accomplished -- buying and wrapping presents for my three-year-old grandson, whose party is tomorrow.

So now I'm keeping an eye on the Olympics games on TV and writing in my journal.

What should I write about today?

How about love?

Now my audit appears to be over, and my book is out, two preoccupations for the past months can be replaced with new ones. I can already tell that writing of this sort, the personal type, is rushing back into my life, filling the void.

I must have been holding back -- I know I was holding back, during a period when I felt my life was on hold. That's what it's like to be under investigation by any authority. You don't know how bad it could get.

Even having done nothing wrong, I feared somehow getting caught up in the bureaucratic system that deals injustice every day of the year. The psychological pressure was so severe at times I had trouble sleeping, or concentrating on anything else.

But now, feeling relieved, I'm contemplating life through a new lens. How would I wish to live my life if I could?

One thing for sure is I want to see friends more often -- both old friends and new ones.

So I've started the process of reaching out and reconnecting with people, and also opening up to new people.

Love.

It's funny how when two people meet and begin sensing, even vaguely, the possibility of a romantic connection together, they tend to tell each other their stories.

Particularly, the stories of their previous relationships.

When we're young, those stories may not be very complicated or numerous, but by middle age, they tend to have become seriously complex.

Decades past that, all sorts of starts and stops and breakups and beginnings mush together in your mind to the point you may sense some patterns.

For me, the sweet pattern of sharing our past love stories is one of our good traits.

It would be difficult for me to be with someone who was extremely angry or bitter about her past loves. I've come to know that no one can stay in that kind of foul mood for long without poisoning the rest of their life and undermining any new relationships they might be capable of.

Love is, of course, the most basic story for writers. Not always in the healthiest of ways. Because we may be prone, at times, to be more transfixed by the story of our love than the love itself -- by that I mean the relationship itself.

Stories are great, but they can't beat the real thing.

Nevertheless, people of all sorts have been writing love stories and love songs forever -- all over earth -- in every culture and language.

The degree of subtlety varies. Some feel free to explicitly describe their loves; others employ metaphor and symbolism.

Now that I'm older, I feel free to share my stories with people I meet, after a decent interval, of course, even when there is no sense of any potential romantic involvement. I take this as a sign that my understanding of "love" has broadened, and now some of the intimacy I used to save for my lover can be shared with other, more casual friends.

Maybe this is part of my own evolution, this particular year, under these particular conditions.

On a quiet Saturday afternoon, with the Olympics playing in the background, on mute, the sounds of my fingertips tapping on a keyboard soothes me. I'm writing yet another story, hoping it helps someone somewhere besides me.

But it's helping me as well. That's probably why I'll never stop doing it.

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