Unremarkable.

The writer, Annie Dillard, famously said, “how we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” This was in defense of her obsessive reading habit. 

Dillard felt there were few better ways to spend her life than with the lives of others through words on the page.

I agree that spending days with others through books is a nice way to spend time.

However, it isn’t the best way.

For me, there’s no better way to spend my days than brushing up against the sharp edges of reality. To throw myself into situations that I’m unfamiliar or uncomfortable with and see what I find while I’m there.

Most often this comes from conversations. More specifically, it comes in the form of conversations with people whom I have biases or judgements about, then letting those judgements and biases melt away as I listen to them speak or spend time with them.

It’s one of life’s most simple joys.

And it’s the reason I keep a diary in my back pocket at all times. I never know when I’ll find myself in one of those moments. And when I do, I want to record them so I can look back whenever I feel like it.

By examining my mundane life and that of those around me, I’ve found anything but the mundane.

I came to this conclusion when a co-worker asked how my night went earlier this evening. 

“Unremarkable.” I replied.

But it wasn’t true. 

I asked that same coworker if he were asked to describe this very night at 80 years old, what would he say?

He said he wouldn’t be able to describe it because nothing really happened to him.

This illuminated my point.

His life happened. If you pay close enough attention, remarkable things happen to and all around you, I said.

I had a group of women tell me that I resemble the reality TV star, Scott Disick. I had an incident with a co-worker where I felt disrespected but chose not to address it in hopes that it was an accident. Time will tell if it was a mistake not to address it. I was invited, for the first time, to the bar next door after work but declined to come home and do this. I met the gentleman who runs the security for the entire premises and we talked about his time in Thailand and discussed our thoughts on Buddhism.

It was all the reality of my life. 

And it seemed unremarkable in the moment.

But this day’ll lead to tomorrow. If I do it enough times, I’ll be 80 and wonder how I got there.  

Dillard was right. 

All we are is all we do.