If I had the energy, I would go back to Ikea for more bookcases, to line the walls of my room, and the living room, and maybe the hallway and the dining room too, and then I’d fill them all with books.
If I had the energy, I would go back to school to become a rabbi, or a cantor, or at least a Jewish studies professor.
If I had the energy I would go for long walks in different places every day, sniffing the smells and breathing the air and listening to all of the sounds, like Cricket and Ellie like to do.
If I had the energy I would finish writing the novels I’ve started, no matter how many revisions it takes or how much time I’d have to spend fighting my internal demons, and I would keep reminding myself that writing the book is the important thing, even if no one ever reads it.
If I had the energy I would live on a farm, with horses and sheep and alpacas and one of every kind of dog in the world!
If I had the energy, I would go back to ice skating and tennis and learn how to just love what I can do and not always compare my abilities to the people who do these things at the highest levels.
If I had the energy I would make dinner every night, learning new and complicated recipes for meals that I would love to eat.
If I had the energy I would travel across Israel, and then across the United States, and then across Europe and then Asia, learning new things and eating new foods and meeting new people.
If I had the energy, I would go back to school for a PsyD, and train with people I admire, and become a child psychologist so I could help the kids I don’t know how to help now.
If I had the energy I would write memoirs and mysteries and musicals; I would write down everything I know and every question I have, and then I would read and study and ask and interview until all of my questions were answered, and then I’d start all over again with new questions.
If I had the energy I would practice guitar and piano every day, and then learn how to play the violin, and the drums.
If I had the energy I would do the gardening and the landscaping at the co-op so that no one would ever cut one more branch off of one more pawpaw tree.
But to be fair, if I had all of that energy, I would be overwhelmed, with too much to do and no idea how to decide which of my priorities should go first, and not enough time or money to do it all anyway. Because there are so many versions of me in my imagination, and they all keep competing for what little time and energy and focus I actually have. And even now, when the amount of energy I have in any given day has dwindled down to something incredibly small, I still can’t focus enough to fill that time well and accomplish the things that should be possible, because I spend so much time arguing with myself, unable to stick to one version of me, even for a day, even for an hour.
So maybe it’s okay that I don’t have the energy to do everything my imagination can come up with, because that would be too much to fit into any one life. And most likely, if I had more energy, I would have an even longer, more unreasonable list of things to do, and the same feeling of failure to live with.
Maybe the goal is to accept the amount of energy I have today, and hope for more for tomorrow, and be kinder to myself about the limits, to my energy and my focus and my decision making skills,…but I should definitely get over to Ikea to get those bookcases one of these days.
If you haven’t had a chance yet, please check out my Young Adult novel, Yeshiva Girl, on Amazon. And if you feel called to write a review of the book, on Amazon, or anywhere else, I’d be honored.
Yeshiva Girl is about a Jewish teenager on Long Island, named Isabel, though her father calls her Jezebel. Her father has been accused of inappropriate sexual behavior with one of his students, which he denies, but Izzy implicitly believes it’s true. As a result of his problems, her father sends her to a co-ed Orthodox yeshiva for tenth grade, out of the blue, and Izzy and her mother can’t figure out how to prevent it. At Yeshiva, though, Izzy finds that religious people are much more complicated than she had expected. Some, like her father, may use religion as a place to hide, but others search for and find comfort, and community, and even enlightenment. The question is, what will Izzy find?
rachelmankowitz 