I've done much examining of my past recently by looking, often painfully, in the mirror.
"...look at the wild ass in heat out in the wilderness, sniffing the wind for the scent of a mate - no matter who - unrestrained and purposeless except for one thing, the satisfaction of desire.
"That is what you look like...dominated by appetite and impulse, your lives are empty of commitment, purpose, continuity. You are frantic and busy, rushing here and there, wherever there is the slightest suggestion that you might satisfy something or another.
"We don't daily find a time apart from the crowd, a time of silence and solitude, for preparing for the day's journey. 'A very original man,' says Gary Wills, 'must shape his life, make a schedule that allows him to reflect, and study, and create.'"
Two worlds constantly, horrifically collide. By choice I'm in the world but not of it. Sometimes, when my back is to the window - my window onto the street, the world - and as I stare in silence and with aloneness into the fire, I know that to walk the straight and narrow path is (never past tense) a difficult decision that requires an hourly recommitment. Even so I don't always pull it off.
But only so many times can I ask myself after hitting my own head with a hammer, why does it hurt.
I consciously choose life and aliveness over numbness, even if my nerve ends are bloodied and mangled: I acknowledge and examine my pain, knowing that it's the price of being wonderfully, gloriously alive.
No comments:
Post a Comment