I just spent two weeks in contemplative peace. Some time was devoted to rest and some to hunting (which is its own form of meditation).
I hoped to gather my thoughts. I had the intention to make sense of the current mess. How did we get here? What does it all mean? Did the heartbreak of 2020 have to be as it has been? Was it necessary? Does necessity make it better? Are we feeling the sharp pain of a power grab or dull throbbing remorse as a lost situation gasps in its deathbed? Are the two mutually exclusive? Who can bear a full year of gaslighting? Was it only a year? What is to become of the ones who’ve already forgotten the before time?
Am I seeing an ending or a beginning? Does anyone else see what I do?
I couldn’t do it. It’s too big to encompass, to weighty to elucidate, to much for a mere blogger. The only solution is to wait. People will come to their own conclusions in due time… if they’re capable. And if they can’t? The solution to that problem is above my pay grade.
I wrote a 2,000 word rant. I discarded it. I wrote a 1,500 word carefully considered analysis. I discarded it. I scribbled notes and ignored them. I had more false starts than I care to revisit. In the end, I realized the truth. Nothing I write will be equal to witnessing what has happened and was probably fated to occur. Strange and destructive, yet irresistible and attractive; I looked it square in the face and took in its full measure. To witness, one must look. Not everyone looks. Even fewer see.
What summation does justice to a year of constant harassment? All is in flux; a people simultaneously losing freedoms and gaining a spine. It’s not even limited to my country… does not Europe flounder? Once upon a time there was the phrase “western civilization”…
It seems overwhelming but then again, it’s meant to. It’s artificial. If you didn’t have media, most of what’s claimed to be “important” would be imperceptible. Meanwhile, the sun rises each day. It does that with or without CNN. Which is why the sunrise matters and CNN doesn’t. To think otherwise is to indulge in pretend battles with fiercely imaginary people. Hollow, simulated, creatures, bereft of connection or accomplishment; twisted by lack of self, they burn what they cannot break, consume what they cannot sow. Violent but only in their minds, they’ve neither thrown nor taken a punch. They bellow insults into the wind; thinking that if only they bay loud enough it’ll break the silence within. It won’t.
It is wiser, and was once common sense, to build your house on a foundation of stone, not theater. So I have returned to stone, as all wise folk do.
Here’s what matters. The cycle continues. My dog died. I have a new puppy.
Not much in life is better than a puppy. I am happy.
