It's All About Today

Making my nephew laugh on Easter.

When I returned from Mexico in 2003, quite a few of my friends remarked that I wasn’t as “wound up” as I was before I’d lived there. I think they were right, and here’s an example: My new job was making me miserable. The people were shallow and the pay was lousy, so I decided to quit. Before Mexico I would have saved my money, found a new job and given a proper two week’s notice. But that wasn’t the post-Mexico me. I didn’t have another job lined up, I didn’t give notice…just walked out one day for lunch and never went back. It was the first and last time I ever did anything like that, and it felt great. I found another job, paid rent on time and life went on.

Mexicans are really good about living in the moment. Living for today. They make decisions based on what is true today, not what might happen tomorrow. If you offer someone 10 pesos for a taco today or promise to come back tomorrow and pay 1,000 pesos for the same taco, they’ll take the 10 today, thank you very much. 

They even have a special verb tense (the subjunctive, used frequently) that recognizes things might not go our way. It might sound a little morbid to those of us in the US, but it’s really meant to be deferential to fate and any god who might be determining our path.

I’ve been through plenty of transitional times in my life, and this “live for today” mentality has been a great tool. This is one of those times. I don’t know for sure where I’ll be mid- to late-May. I don’t know what my living room will look like in 2 months, and I don’t know how I’ll spend my next birthday or Halloween. I can imagine and try to plan, but that wouldn’t be very subjunctive of me.

So today, I’m focusing on what I know right now. I’ve been chosen by a birth mom. I have an intended son who weighs as much as a cantaloupe. The white blooming trees outside are so fragrant they almost stink, I had a perfectly beautiful Easter with my family yesterday, and I just picked all the red jelly beans out of a basket at work. Yay me.