The sky is gray this morning.

Not the pleasant sort of gray that makes you want another cup of coffee and a good book. This is Caribbean gray—the kind that hangs low over the bay and tells you that somewhere up there is a whole lot of water just waiting to fall.

And I need to go to town.

I’m planning to cook something tonight, and I’m missing a few vegetables. Normally that’s simple enough. Get in the dinghy, cross the bay, tie up at the dock, buy what I need, and come home.

Except I really don’t feel like making that trip in a pouring rain.

So I wait.

There was a time when a morning like this might have irritated me. I have things I want to do. The weather isn’t cooperating. My plans are on hold.

And once you start thinking that way, it’s remarkably easy to make a list.

I can’t go to town.

I can’t get the vegetables.

I can’t start preparing dinner.

I can’t do what I planned to do.

Funny how quickly one little rain cloud can take possession of an entire day.

But it hasn’t.

I can make another cup of coffee.

I can read.

I can write.

There are things aboard that need tending. There are conversations worth having. There is music to practice. There are a dozen small jobs I’ve walked past because something else seemed more important at the time.

I can sit in the cockpit and watch the rain come across the bay if that’s what the morning decides to give me.

And when I think about it that way, something changes.

Not the weather.

Me.

Years ago, my mother gave me a book called Chop Wood, Carry Water. I don’t remember much of the book anymore, but I’ve never forgotten the idea behind the title.

Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.

After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.

We spend an astonishing amount of our lives believing we’ll finally begin living properly when circumstances cooperate.

When I have enough money.

When work settles down.

When the children are grown.

When the boat is fixed.

When the weather clears.

When this problem is solved.

Then I’ll get on with it.

But life seems stubbornly uninterested in providing perfect conditions.

There is always weather.

Sometimes it’s a gray sky over a Caribbean bay. Sometimes it’s an empty bank account, a broken engine, a relationship that didn’t turn out the way we hoped, a body that doesn’t work quite like it used to, or simply a plan that went sideways.

Some of those things we can change.

Some we cannot.

Wisdom may lie partly in knowing the difference, but I think there is another piece we sometimes overlook:

What can I do right now?

Not what could I do if circumstances were different.

Not what should have happened yesterday.

Not what I might be able to do tomorrow.

Right now.

There is almost always something.

Chop the wood.

Carry the water.

Make the coffee.

Write the page.

Fix the hinge.

Call the friend.

Practice the song.

Watch the rain.

And when the weather finally opens a little window across the bay, get in the dinghy and go buy the vegetables.

The remarkable thing is that none of this requires enlightenment.

Maybe that’s the point.

Perhaps enlightenment isn’t some distant harbor we’re trying to reach.

Perhaps it is simply learning to stop arguing with the weather long enough to do whatever is ours to do today.

The sky is still gray.

I still need vegetables.

And I still don’t intend to cross that bay in a downpour.

But there is plenty I can do until the rain decides what it’s going to do.

So I’ll get on with it.

There is wood to chop.

There is water to carry.