From time to time, it occurs to me how amazingly, ridiculously, wonderful this life actually is; I don’t know ’bout you, but sometimes, it sneaks up on me. I get all caught up in the various travails and traumas happening around me, or some element of any of it that pings my ego, or some other element that pings my sense of injustice or melancholy over the sheer lack of pluralism and humanity in the world, or well, you know, [insert distraction de jour here]; for a spot of time (maybe a day, a week, a month, a year, a decade…!) I let myself get all wrapped around the axle thinking “this matters” in some way that is independent of my active decision to grant it that “mattering”.
Don’t get me wrong, I think a lot of things matter; but I’m not fool enough to think that because I think this is so, everyone else (or anyone else, for that matter) could, should, or would.
I’m especially not fool enough to think “my” perspective (or this groups, or that groups, or this cause’s, or that cause’s, etc) is something that needs to be propagated upon (read: forced) others.
I firmly believe, feel, and think that the surest sign that I’m off in the weeds is that I’m all “het up” about “what someone who isn’t me OUGHT to be doing, feeling, saying, or thinking”. Naturally, I regularly pick my head up and notice that, once again, I’m off in those very weeds… but I recognize it’s part of the human condition to slip into them any time there isn’t serious thought in effect (which, let’s face it, is more often than it should be, even for me).
But more often than not lately, I find I’m not quick as I used to be to trundle off into those weeds. Now, I’ll catch myself standing along the border, sure enough; foot raised and all set to take a sprint, but I think that catching of myself is beautiful because it proves that the effort, practice, and work of attempting to shift it IS, in fact, effective. (Damn good thing, because let me tell you, it IS work.)
All this blather of a divergence from the first paragraph being little more than internal monologue made writing, and all of it to demonstrate that no, frankly, it’s not a ‘contradiction’ of the first paragraph; indeed, it makes that first paragraph all the more delightful to me. Why? Well, first and foremost, because it reveals to me that I’m making progress on getting away from the binary, the dichotomy, the ‘black and white’ that so often foxes me as a human; you know, accepting the ‘bad’ and the ‘good’ equally and not pretending that one is or has to be relevant to the other.
Also, because I begin to see beyond the silly, ledger-based system of “me-ness” and am slowly discovering that there is a truly interesting expanse of experience that, regardless of classification or judgment, has an intrinsic wonder. (Yours does too, actually; as do we all.)
Thinking about life to present along pretty much any line of contemplation just leaves me staggered, really. The sheer number of intersecting events, people, and happenings to get from any point of “there” to this point, here and now, is really quite powerfully incredible. Particularly so when looked at in the scale and scope of everything happening along this timeline.
Do you ever feel this way? As if the reality that you, as you are, where you are, regardless circumstance(s), are truly a miracle in motion?
I often feel this way about “everyone”; I mean, think about it, every person you see around you, every minute of every day of your life, is an amazing story… and you may only get to truly know a paragraph of their tale, or perhaps you only get to see the cover and wonder what’s inside.
A human library; that’s the analogy I often use. I once knew someone who preferred the concept of the “Library of Babel”, but that’s too refined for me, I think. THIS is no library; there are no carefully coordinated stacks, no organizational systems; many tomes rest where they were dropped and many more were dropped into places where they can no longer be discovered.
And sometimes, sometimes, I encounter my book and, for a moment, don’t recognize it as my own. Like today…. which is why I have this expansive feeling of genuine, delighted surprise. Kind of like finding something unexpected only to discover it was only unexpected because you were so busy looking for something you’d expect. Heh.
I supposed I should admit that this silly bit of a ramble may be quite nonsense. It may only make sense to me; then again, who knows?
Here’s to unexpected editions of forgotten favorites, eh? May you find a few as well.
ObHaiku:
So many chapters,
Seasons in an epic book;
How did I write this?