Call me old-fashioned, but I believe that consistency is key.  It is the key to long term success in any undertaking.  It is the key to love and good parenting.  Consistency is the key to life.  Any true musician knows that the path to mastery starts with mind-numbing consistency.  I can still hear a metronome mocking me, in time no less.  Perhaps I'm overstating the importance of consistency, but it has been on my mind of late and (as this, the first blog in months, might attest) I've been lacking.


I can hear my father's voice now.  He was and continues to be a man of startling consistency-- in all the best ways.  My father is like clockwork: he is up before the sun and home from work after dark.  He takes the same route around the supermarket every week, with a brand-loyalty that would give an ad man a hard on.  I haven't lived in his house since I was 18 and I bet I know what's in the fridge right now.  He is a man who has routine and loyalty; yet, he is not a man who is so locked into that consistency that he cannot try new things.  Heaven knows we tried a variety of ethnic cuisines as kids and my father would always encourage me to "open" my mind.  There is a distinction between consistency and mindless regiment.  My father is a believer in correction of bad habits and I find myself hoping it's genetic.


There are many ways in which I fear I will never live up to my father and foremost on that list is consistency.


I look around at my life these days.  I think about all the broken promises to myself.  I don't sleep well.  But I also believe that every day is another chance to turn it all around.  It is easy to get wrapped up tight around all of my faults and sins of omission.  In fact, it is hard to escape my special brand of masochistic negativity.  Still I can't help but hope that brief moments of grace and serenity show me the baby steps towards the consistency I crave.  I do believe that it is a process-- a life we choose.  Sure, I have no 9-5 to go to and no arbitrary parameters on my schedule to aid me.  But there is no reason to believe it can't start today.


I hope you'll continue to hear from me-- and right soon...