Repeat
“Repetition is not redundancy” -James Finley
For just over three years I hosted an AirBnb using the guest house in our backyard. A practice I concluded about a year ago. I knew the size and location of the space would have some appeal to short-term travelers; and yet, the popularity was more than I could have anticipated. When I closed the listing (as a result of moving and the coronavirus) I had hosted almost two hundred unique visits. Most of these guests I never met, and they only stayed a couple nights. They travelled from dozens of different states, and even internationally, for a variety of reasons. What lacked variety was the steps I took to host them. Seeing that final number meant that I had made a king bed, disinfected a bathroom, and swept and vacuumed four hundred square feet two hundred times in just thirty-eight months. And many more loads of laundry.
When I first started hosting the whole process would take about an hour. But by the end I could do everything in forty minutes or less. The sweeping, wiping, mopping, folding, vacuuming and bed making became so rote, so repetitive, I never had to think about where to start or what to do next. I effortlessly moved from one step to the next, making the task less a chore and more a ceremony. As I said, it wasn’t always this easy. I remember struggling to make the king bed neatly or reworking how I folded the towels to properly store them. But the repetition allowed me to improve and move beyond simply cleaning.
Frequently I’d fill the time with a podcast or music, perhaps a phone call to a friend or family member. But other times I would work in silence, hearing nothing but the whooshing of linens, the misting of cleaning bottles and the humming of the vacuum cleaner. And the repetition of these noises, of this practice, was far from redundant or superfluous. It was essential, yes, because every guest was expecting a clean space. But it was also meaningful because I had done it so many times. Some moments are significant because they are infrequent or only happen once. But some moments are significant because they happen all the time. Their frequency makes them notable.
Repetition has been at the helm the past ten months in much of our day, in many facets of our life. The whooshing of our breath in cloth masks, the misting of hand sanitizer and the humming of our devices we’re hoping will tell us when life can get back to what it was before. And yet, I personally had more friends contract the virus in January than I did the previous months combined. There were times I had to clean the guest house when I didn’t want to, or did it for the fourth day in a row, but the repetition in the practice kept me from becoming exasperated. So, these days, from the time when I wake up to when I go to bed I trust the effortless movements I have learned will make the day as ceremonious as it deserves. For there is no getting it back.
“Repetition is not redundancy”
May you examine the repetitiveness of your life and smile at its presence. May you feel the comfort of doing something again; not because it is important, but because it is familiar. May you not view your situation or life as something rote or redundant, but may you have the presence to effortlessly move to the beat you have created. And may you, my friend, cherish the mystery of this life you are living this day.