Post 5: Prime the pump

It began with my 3 mile run around Pines Lake. I’ve done this run thousands of times, and it is a fair measuring stick of how I’m doing mentally. When I’m feeling low, although exercise always boosts my mood it only happens AFTER I finish the run. During the run my mind is looping all over the place with impossibilities. In short, all the things I don’t have, and all the things I won’t have because of the things I don’t have and the way I am thinking. Lot’s of self-defeating circular logic. However, when my mood is good, or I at least feel some sense of centered, my mood and mind operate in reverse, and I get the boost WHILE I am running. Now I’m caught up in possibilities. I say caught up intentionally, as sometimes chasing all the things I imagine I can have, can take my just as out of the moment as obsessing about the difficult things. Either way, I’d take the up-mood run over the other choice every day of the week and twice on Sunday.

Today I was equal parts chasing my optimistic thoughts, and catching them, roping them down, and, if they were little bronco thoughts, they were getting busted, and put into a corral for later. Here’s what I got.

Songs. RF is very song driven, which would be instantly fantastic if it were a screen play, but as a novel I’ve been at a loss of how to communicate the songs only by mentioning them and including just enough lyrics to not get sued. I’m pretty sure there is a standard word limit. However, something else came to me.

I’m not going to mention all the songs here, but I will mention the first song: Om, by the Moody Blues. My idea is to make the first 5 sections into a chapter, or if each section is a chapter, group them under Part One. Whether it be a chapter heading with 5 sections, or Part One heading with 5 chapters, I will place small portion of the lyrics, in this case from Om, in front of what will be read. For instance:

Part One: Om

"This garden universe vibrates complete, Some, we get a sound so sweet." - The Moody Blues

What is amazing serendipity, and it is by no means an accident, since I've been playing with finding the right songs for years, is in the first 5 sections, Carl is nothing if not moody. The present song or sound he is chasing is Om, regardless if the Moody Blues are mentioned - although they could be.