on procrastinating. portent. words. definitions. and time.

I mentioned procrastinating in the previous entry. It’s true. I did. Procrastinate. I wanted to go public with a journal. But I was putting it off.

“Too many books, so little time.” – Frank Zappa

He was right – I get it. As a reader, I feel that very thing at times.

But I don’t feel it just about there being tons of books and hardly the time to read them.

In general, I feel it about having too much of one thing and being limited by too little of another. As in:

“Too many things to note and jot, so little time.” – Sosanni V

That realization actually stalled me and kept me from creating this journal… But I eventually worked around that. Obviously.

But I’m glad I started the journal today, because tomorrow is April Fool’s Day. I wouldn’t want to start my journal on that day. I am so weird that way. Superstitious. Looking for the ‘auspicious’ and the ‘ominous’ in random things? Even regarding ‘April Fool’s Day’?

Well, not really. It’s actually the word ‘fool’ that now bears more meaning than it ever did before – to me, at least.

The fool. To me, it used to mean the silly, rather ‘reckless/without thought’ person. Eh…ok…So April Fool’s Day? Silliness, but harmless. That’s what I used to think.

But lately, the word fool has taken on another meaning for me. When I hear the word fool, I tend to think of the word with its Biblical meaning. Maybe because I am older…Maybe because it, like so many other things, portrays more of a sign of the times.

The Biblical meaning? I am not the expert, but I do know that Fool was used in the Old Testament…and this quote comes to mind.

“Fools speak foolishness and make evil plans.” (Isaiah 32:6)

However, here is what really rings close to home. In the New Testament. Jesus spoke very carefully. His words were few, but they spoke volumes. Volumes that, in my opinion, reveal their deeper meanings only as you dig into them. ( A perfect example of “Seek, and ye shall find.”)

Jesus used the word ‘fool‘ while making a very serious accusation, calling out the Pharisees. “You fools”, He said, while addressing them. He actually used the Greek word “αφρoνες” – ‘Aphron/ plural Aphrones’. That world literally means ‘without mind’.

“Fool” takes on a meaning beyond ‘silly’, beyond ‘recklessly without thought’…it now means being without mind – being ‘senseless’ and ‘crazed’.

So – back to the procrastination I mentioned in the first lines…. It comes as no surprise to me that I really wanted to hit the keyboard with this journal starting today.

Not Tomorrow.

Start writing my journal on April Fool’s Day? Besides a day seasoned with the traditional ‘lies’ and ‘tricks’? It is a day that celebrates the fool.

And now, when I hear the word fool I think of Jesus’ definition of a fool….Especially now.

There were fools, madmen, and senseless people walking about and creating chaos during Jesus’ time. And I’m sure they never stopped destroying society for the generations that followed…up to now.

Now. What is ‘now‘ if history keeps on repeating itself? Now could mean our unique contemporary take on an old problem. OR. Now could mean ‘same shit, different day’.

That notion, ‘same shit, different day‘, reminds me of a line from King Lear…(Will Shakespeare was a crafty wordsmith, wasn’t he…regardless of whether or not some believe it was Sir Frances Bacon at work penning away with the nom de plume of Shakespeare.)

Anyway. It is a line from Lear that comes to mind. A no brainer.

and here I am…feeling as if we are living in a world reminiscent of what Will of the Shakespeares described.

and here I am…baking brioche and creating a journal…as madness grabs hold of the world.