With quiet anticipation, I pick up my favorite knife and the avocado that I have deemed is most likely ripe, finally. I slice it in half and pull it apart. Yes! It looks like a good one. This makes me so happy.
Two days later, I repeat this exercise. I cut this new avocado. I feel let down. This one has lots of brown spots and strings. So disappointing. I end up salvaging maybe half of it, but the pure enjoyment is not there.
In the backyard in the home where I grew up, we had a huge avocado tree. Perhaps that is why I love avocados. Or maybe it is also because they can be enjoyed in so many ways. Or perhaps it is partly because of the anticipation. There are no guarantees that the avocado will be ripe, delicious, or smooth. Maybe there are experts in the field of avocado science who can make that determination, but I have not mastered it.
I have been thinking about our lives these days and how we are living in a time of ambiguity. We just don’t know when the virus will subside enough for us to go back to a somewhat “normal” life. I got my second dose of the vaccine yesterday, for which I am truly grateful. And yet, so many people around the country and around the world have not yet gotten the jabs, including my husband and our extended family members.
Over the past year we read predictions about when we might be able to travel again or open schools fully. And then a spike in cases happened and plans changed. So we are learning to live each day in a state of not knowing. Of being open to what is, sometimes being disappointed, sometimes being delighted with a new taste or discovery.
It is not easy to live in the present with no guarantees for the future. Sometimes I am mad and frustrated. And then I get over myself and move on. I hope I am growing and learning. I suppose that I am like an avocado. You might not know what you are going to get today.