Choosing optimism

It has been over a month since I’ve written. One way to describe this would be to say “I haven’t had the time,” or “I’ve been too busy.” Another way, one which acknowledges that I have the same 24 hours in a day* as everyone else, is to say, “I’ve chosen not to write for the last month.” Instead I’ve chosen sleep, work, travel, life outside the computer. It is true that my time spent on work and volunteer activities has increased in the last month. But these too are choices I’ve made, and in approaching this blog again after several weeks away, it seems important to remember that these are choices. Options.

For these options I am grateful. Not everyone has the options to choose when, where, at what, how and how much to work. When I am able to remember that, I am better able to see the bright side of what I myself have chosen. Optimism.

During this month I was able to start (and almost finish) a book I’ve wanted to read for a long time, Arundati Roy’s The God of Small Things. In the spirit of acknowledging her beautiful writing—and how often she made me look up new words—I decided today to take out my 1966 Reader’s Digest Great Encyclopedic Dictionary and look up the following:

opt v.i. To choose, decide, elect. [ < F. opter < L optare to choose, wish]
optic adj. Pertaining to the eye or vision. [ < MF optique < Med.L opticus < Gk. optikos < optos seen < stem op- as in opsomai I shall see]
optimism n. 1. A disposition to look on the bright side of things: opposed to pessimism. 2. The doctrine that everything is ordered for the best. 3. The doctrine that the universe is constantly tending toward a better state. [ < F optimisme < L optimus best ]

Hmm, a little rosy. Am I a true optimist? Certainly not by all meanings. These definitions make me recall—

—At this point in writing this, the electricity shuts off. I should have heeded the first clap of thunder, which set off several car alarms. But how often do we get electric storms in Seattle strong enough to knock out the power? In a second it and the computer both come back to life. My document, however, does not. I look up:

pessimism n. 1. A disposition to take a gloomy or cynical view of affairs: opposed to optimism. 2. The doctrine that the world and life are essentially evil. 3. The theory that the existing universe is the worst possible world. [ < L pessimus worst + -ISM]

Yikes! Relieved that at least I’m not a true pessimist, either, I retype my thoughts and carry on—Seattle poet Matt Gano has a poem about optimism and opticians and seeing and choosing, and after looking the words up I like the poem even better. I like to think of my own personal brand of optimism as seeing clearly the world for what it is, and choosing to take actions and interpret events in a way that gives me hope and meaning. In a way that acknowledges the imperfections and even evils in the world but still chooses to do what can be done to nudge the universe towards a better state. This is the optimism that I think Patch Adams, tireless true-life worker for social justice, advocates in describing himself as a “relentless optimist.” This is not the optimism that Barbara Ehrinreich derides in her new book Bright Side on America’s delusional optimism, an un-seeing faith in a brighter future even as we toil hand-over-fist to dismantle that future.

This is the optimism that brings me back to write after a busy month away, in the hope that this choice of how to use my time might illuminate even a small corner of the world.

*don't get me started on Daylight Savings...