motivational

You’re the driver

You know the Model of your Car.
You know just what its powers are.
You treat it with a deal of care,
Nor tax it more than it will bear.
But as to self — that’s different.
Your mechanism may be bent,
Your carburetor gone to grass,
Your engine just a rusty mass.
Your wheels may wobble and your cogs
Be handed over to the dogs,
And on you skip, and skid, and slide,
Without a thought of things inside.
What fools indeed we mortals are
To lavish care upon a Car,
With ne’er a bit of time to see
About our own machinery!

—John Kendrick Bangs (1862–1922), “Motors,” The Cheery Way: A Bit of Verse For Every Day, 1920

An Explanation

You need not think
It’s vanity that makes me prink,
And take much care
To keep myself both fit and fair.
‘Tis not false pride or vain conceit
That keeps me trying to be neat,
But just the plain and simple truth
That I have held to since my youth
That this old frame in which I dwell
Is nothing more than the hotel
In which my Soul and Hopes must stay
Until I’m called to move away,
And for their dwelling-place I plan
To give them quite the best I can,
And keep the place up spick and span.

—John Kendrick Bangs (1862–1922), “An Explanation,” The Cheery Way: A Bit of Verse For Every Day, 1920

Real life

“For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin — real life. But there was always some obstacle in the way. Something to be got through first, some unfinished business; time still to be served, a debt to be paid. Then life could begin. At last it had dawned on me that these obstacles were my life. I was always rolling these stones from my grave.”

—Bette Howland, W-3, 1974

Bursting with life

Though the circular round-and-round of routine be the bulk of life’s affairs, make an occasional jutting diversion — of fun, love, or something that will outlast you — so that the shape and motion of your life shall resemble the lifegiving sun with bright rays shining forth from all directions.

Terri Guillemets