Living on Writer's Block

The two jewel-bright male dragonflies fly over my head as I watch the minnows, the wings of one rasping against the wings of the other as they attempt to shove their opponent off course in their fight to reach the fleeing female. Their rasping harmonizes with the buzzing of Idaho cicadas, relative peace compared with the countryside of Chicago. The minnows in the pool at my feet swirl back and forth, merging with other schools, mingling, and splitting up again into separate flocks of water-sheep, no individual fish thinking for himself but all responding to one another’s movements, creating an intricate, looping dance far more lovely than any waltz or tango. Suddenly the upside down reflections of trees and tall grass are disturbed by large ripples. I look up and notice a few ducks, one a mature female — and the other two? Simply brown, but with no glistening patch of purple to relieve the simple, dark sand color, leading me to believe that this must be a mother and her two almost-mature offspring, out for a swim. The wind sighs over me as it combs the branches of the willow, singing a song only One can understand. Leaves rustle, water trickles, and the wild smell of the outdoors fills my nose. 

Someone made all this. There’s no question. Someone designed all this. In six days. Our imaginations cannot begin to comprehend such a feat. And since those six days He’s spent more than 6,ooo years, according to most sources I agree with, shaping this world into what it is now.

“Can we spare the moment to give it a glance?”

-Nate Wilson (The Riot and the Dance: Earth)

So go out.

Look. Go beyond looking — see. See the wonders of the veins in a blade of grass. Look at the ants. Their segments, the tiny hairs . The minuscule membranes between their legs and bodies, that cover their joints.

Smell. Breathe in the world you’ve been gifted with. Does it smell alive? Or dead? New? Old? Tired? Do you smell leaves and grass and flowers? Or people? They are a gift, too. Even the strangers. Does the city scrape the sky with glass and chrome and cement above you? there is a scent to the city, as there is a scent to the country. What is it?

Feel. The wind caresses your skin, bringing a slight but not unwelcome chill. Even standing alone in the midst of a mown field there is something to feel. The sun on your face. The ground beneath your feet. Feel the world as it moves and lives and breathes around you.

Hear. The world has a voice. Those trees, creaking and rustling in the wind? They have a voice. They are speaking volumes to you right now. The creek truly babbles and chatters as it falls over the beaver dam. Listen to it, for water has many stories to tell. The wind really does whisper to you, secrets of a long-forgotten past. Hear it. The earth is never silent.

Go to a place you’ve always thought of as silent. When you are home alone, in dead quiet, go to your bedroom and shut the door. Get in bed and pull the covers up, put a pillow over your head. You’d think that would be utterly silent. But do you hear your heartbeat throbbing in your ears? As you breathe, do you hear the air rush through your nose, down through your throat and into your chest? That is your life you hear, moving through you, and leaving you slowly with each breath that exits your body.

Feel mortal now?

You do not have forever on this earth; savor each and every moment while you can.