Ralph

Yesterday morning, before work, I read from a book of essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson. It’s writing I’ve returned to again and again over the years, finding something new each time. At twenty, Emerson’s ideas felt like a promise; now, in my forties, they feel like a reminder. Yesterday, those words lifted my spirits near the end of a long week. On the drive to work, I felt a little more alive, a little more “self-reliant.”

At least, for the first part of the drive. As my third coffee of the morning waned and I got closer to the job site, I could feel that energy shifting. Enthusiasm was morphing into anxiety, tightening into a tension in the back of my neck. Maybe it was the daunting task of translating Emerson’s lofty words into real-life actions. What was I thinking reading something so uplifting before work? Or maybe it was just too much coffee.

But when I got out of the truck and saw the wall we’ve been working on for weeks, that tension shifted into a familiar barrage of self-doubt. I saw each uneven stone, each imperfect line, and suddenly, the task ahead felt impossible.

I know by now this is just part of the deal when undertaking any creative project: feelings change not just day to day but often hour by hour, sometimes minute by minute. What starts as hope or inspiration can turn into frustration or doubt without warning.

I wish I could work only when I feel perfectly ready, when I’m fully energized, when everything’s flowing, when I feel like my best self. But that’s a fantasy. I couldn’t live off the handful of hours a year I feel that way.

Sometimes stonework is a slog.

I’m forty-six. There are days my body doesn’t want to pick up rocks for eight hours. There are days when, after a rough night’s sleep, my mind struggles to keep up with the thousands of micro-decisions that go into building a stone wall. There are days it feels like my body and mind unionize and go on strike.

I’m getting better at showing up and doing the work anyway. It’s the only way the work gets done. And maybe that’s the real lesson in self-reliance—not in waiting for the perfect moment, but in building one stone at a time, doubts and all.