Wide Awake – 2/22/10
Teased mercilessly by my children about a ceaseless search for a two-hour weekend nap on the living room couch, I think that the title “Wide Awake” seems an apt name for a blog. It’s also a personal objective of mine, a goal of living life fully aware of what’s going on, enjoying what can be enjoyed, learning from what has to be done regardless.
It seems that living wide awake way may not always look like that to others. I’m a type A personality under a friendly veneer; restrained action and speech might sometimes be mistaken for laziness. Sitting, thinking, listening and breathing is a form of karmic punishment for me, something needed but resisted until absolutely necessary (sick in bed). Once in a while, a peek into heaven during some peace and quiet causes me to set the to-do list aside.
I’ve been recently watching my 13-year old son John and his pursuit of joy with nothing less than awe. Sure, he shows the occasional curled lip snarl of a teenager. He avoids getting out of bed on school days, does not like doing chores or cleaning his room or taking showers. He rebels against the growing demands of homework. His bliss comes when he’s sitting near the top of a large tree in our front yard, 30 feet up, imagining living fulltime in a tree-house there. A monk in sneakers, he has no fear of heights. Saint Simeon Stylites, who climbed up a 50-foot pillar and lived there in silence for 35 years, would have understood and waved over to him from the top of his pillar. Friday night, he watched the sunset from the top of the tree and climbed down in the dark using his headlamp. The tree-house may or may not get built; but he’s got a place to go where he is at peace.
There aren’t many places a grown up can get away like that. Even in the wilderness, we’re often never really out of touch. Three, four, even five satellites will plot your altitude, longitude and latitude to within six feet. Find yourself out for a walk? No reason to leave the phone or iPod behind – bring it along and stay connected. My Newshour podcasts keep me up on news I don’t have time to watch on TV. The 5,000 songs in my iPod permit me to avoid silence at all costs. Unplugged from the grid, it’s possible to sit in a tent and watch “007 – Quantum of Solace” on a flickering iPod screen. Don’t ask me how I know that.
And yet, peacefulness sneaks up when I’m quiet. I’ve had days of it, self-initiated, sitting in a tent in the woods, or by water, where I’ve felt as if I’ve stepped off a moving walkway to find things strangely, wonderfully alive. It’s fun to talk about, to write about, simply because it’s an exceptional experience. Quite a different thing to make part of life. I can’t help ask myself if it’s something that I look for and find in a more disciplined way. That’s my journey of being “wide awake,” some of which may show up in this blog.
