Taking Inventory

All over the radio you hear, "HUGE inventory close-out sale to make room for fall!" I worked in a men's clothing store when I was in college. Inventory was when we locked the store and stayed up all night counting belts and bad ties. We were the only automated part of the store back then.

We didn't understand the necessity of taking inventory, but it didn't matter. We only needed to understand four words: time-and-a-half.

When I went into rehab taking inventory was important. It's amazing all the things they wanted us to count. Like, how much money we had spent on alcohol. Or, who we held grudges against and for how long; what we were afraid of; and who all we had manipulated, and how. It was like I was visiting a country I hadn't been to...and the country was me.

Last month I started drawing a map of me. I am trying to include every humiliating thing. I don't think it's a country you would like to visit. There is a cemetery where some people who are buried there aren't dead yet. There are several bombed-out churches. There is a massive desert. There are several libraries, three movie theatres, two photograph galleries, and what appears to be a deserted island.

There are ruins, like in Mexico. I have done some careful digging to see what is there.

All in all, it has been a good experience, this map-making. It is a colorful way to take inventory.

I have carried one short sentence in my pocket for when things get dark. You might want to put it on your refrigerator. It is from Rumi, a Persian poet.

"Where there is ruin, there is hope for treasure."