I Am a Digger

“Mine, I’ve come to think, is to become whole. To integrate a lifetime of complexity,

challenges, secrets, luck, privilege, the inheritance of pain, of misunderstanding,

the recompense of all the gifts I have been given with which to explore. I am a digger.

I gnaw. I hope to come to know my own bone.”

Dani Shapiro on her writing of Hourglass

My best conversations with others go deep.

We both speak honestly; we both learn from each other. If we’re lucky, we might even get an

A-ha moment that for me, I’ll tuck away or write on a slip of paper or in my Notes of my phone so I don’t forget it. Because I’ll go back to it.

When the time is right.

I’ve always collected ideas, quotes, thoughts. My desk drawers are filled with slips of paper with sometimes a word, sometimes a phrase. Things that someone looking through my desk would see as trash, the point hidden, the randomness of the word scribbled. But to me, these mean everything.

My re-reading them can take me back, bring me forward, allow me to spiral around the ether of my mind for hours capturing just what I truly think about the phrase. What it means to me. What I want to do with it. Do I want to just ponder it alone? Or share it by writing a blog or an article about it? Or slide it into a scene of a book I’m writing?

These prompts get me thinking, musing, pondering.

Which is such fun for me.

It’s kind of like exercising. After I’ve dug around a little in my mind, I feel better. And if I’ve written a piece about it, better still. Productivity suits me. I’m not one for vegging out, going mindless, although I certainly have things that create a sense of calm in me.

Every time I’m in an airport, I am chewing on how they work. How do so many planes coming and going not run into each other? How in the world do our bags get to our varied locations, through connections, at the same time we all do? While others criticize airports and say how terrible they are, I am just the opposite. I am amazed at how much goes right. I consider airports an extremely challenging project to manage. My mom said – “Really? That’s what you think about at airports?” I guess she doesn’t.

I am a digger.

I prefer taking the risk of going down deep with myself or others because what comes from it is compelling and thought provoking for me. In contrast, I cannot live up in the shallows, talking only about the weather, gossiping about others, or being phony in conversation. That doesn’t feel good for me. I don’t walk away feeling uplifted, inspired or creative.

I think we all gravitate to those like ourselves.

Who do you gravitate toward?

Diggers?

Or those who prefer to let sleeping dogs lie?