This evening, I went to the grocery store.   As I walked in the door, I saw a woman with a tall metal cart.  It was stacked high with white cardboard boxes.  Inside of those boxes were dozens and dozens of donuts.  Glazed ones, pink-iced ones, sprinkled, chocolate, caramel nutty, and so much more.

She was as cute as could be, with her plumpness in stature,  her rosy cheeks, and her joyous disposition as she worked away.  She had come from the bakery… or at least I was assuming so.  Judging from her cart, her hair net, and her apron with smudges of icing across the front.  Anyway, she stacked the boxes of donuts on a wire shelf near the front of the store.  It will be the first thing most people will see tomorrow morning as the enter the grocery.  Day old donuts.  Cheap.  Stacked by Darla.  At least that is what I was calling her in my head.  Darla the Donut Stacker.

It made me smile.

Fifteen minutes later, I was back at home.  On the TV screen in front of me, were images…. horrible images from war-torn Syria.  Small children pointing out snipers in crumbled buildings, and rebels dragging dead bodies through the street.  Gunfire, and injury, and destruction.  Chaos.

It made me cry.

And that is the thing.  On any given day…. we will see thousands of images, and hear just as many sounds.  We are in a constant swirl of sensory stimulus.  In this diverse world of ours…. those images are far and wide.   They could be happy, sad, scary, or fun.  And we are affected as such, if we are aware.

But the truth of it is…. my mind wanders like I am on the open road.  I think it almost has to.

So.  A little later….. I  watched a report on being mindful in life.  Being in the moment, where ever that moment may be.  The featured individual was Jon Kabat-Zinn.  He is an MIT-trained scientist who’s been practicing mindfulness for 47 years.  But if we take this literally, like he suggests….  for instance….. only thinking about eating while you eat, only thinking about walking while you walk, and on.   Well… how do you ever get anything done?

I don’t think it can truly be down to the extreme that he suggests.  It leaves no room for imagination, abstract thought, and the subsequent actualization of those thoughts.    At least… I don’t understand how.

I can be present in some things though.  Like taking notice of Darla the Donut Stacker…. and finding the presence of joy in that that moment.

But once again… this is yet another example of me having more questions about life than I have answers.  Sometimes….  I wish I could understand it all.  And in the next breath….. I am thankful that I don’t.