The traffic cone and the under-construction writing life
A few weeks ago, my son and I were headed out for preschool and encountered on our front stoop a beat up orange traffic cone. It was a strange thing to find. Even stranger to imagine that someone had walked all the way up to my front door to place it there — for reasons I would never know.
I moved the cone to the grass strip between the sidewalk and street, hoping beyond reason that it would be collected by whoever left it there. No such luck. After a few days of the cone's resolute presence in front of our house, I moved it to the driveway where it still stands today.
Every time I see the cone, the metaphor I have made of it plunks inside my ribs. That cone I don't quite feel responsible for and can't seem to properly dispose of brings to mind all of the gray area in my life: the self-care I intend to do but don't do, the limiting stories I tell myself, the administrative tasks such as returning the too-small boots and too-small curtains that feel just too hard to deal with. In the few, short weeks of our strange acquaintance, that cone has come to stand in brightly for all of my immobilized places.
The traffic cone is an interesting symbol, because it is used to call attention to a problem while also offering some encouragement that the problem will be addressed if you just stay out of the way long enough to let it. I find myself experiencing this solemn and mute visitation with a feeling that my under-construction life has been duly noted. And through that imagined witnessing, somehow, a sense of repair has come over me.
Something as unremarkable and unexpected as a traffic cone has awakened me to new opportunities to peel back a heavy layer whose weight has only now become evident. I call the handyman and together we carry the treadmill back into the house from the garage. I buy my first new pair of running shoes in at least six years — three years after my foot increased a half-size from pregnancy. I discover that my son's 5:30 a.m. waking time allows me to cook a wonderful meal in the morning that we can sit down to enjoy immediately when we get home at dinner time. I use my middle-of-the night waking times to do the writing I wish I had all day to do. I buy the new computer whose necessity parallels the running shoes. I get the blood test that was recommended in July and then the iron supplements that are clearly needed as a result.
Spontaneously, my under-construction writing life is getting simpler, clearer, more streamlined. The activities that need to be in place for me to feel rested, friendly, inspired, invigorated, are finding their fit in my dense days that seemed impenetrable until now.
The only thing I haven't done that needs doing is get rid of the traffic cone. The public proclamation of a writing life under construction feels apt to me — even if no one gets the reference but me. I am grateful for the reminder that a single, well-chosen symbol can bless us, galvanize us to release our burdens, invite us into the ease that is always there waiting for us, if we learn to allow it.
