Or blogs for that matter...

Lately I've been learning to notice the sublime while letting the simple remain as such.

"This is what I have to avoid, I must not put in strangeness where there is none. I think that is the big danger in keeping a diary: you exaggerate everything. You continually force the truth because you're always looking for something."

Jean-Paul Sartre - Nausea

"Humanity in every age, and even today, looks to works of art to shed light upon its path and its destiny."

How rare it is when my emotions, beliefs, and thoughts align, when all I know of myself is in agreement. On days such as this, I'm surrounded by suffering, intolerance, noise, hatred, distraction... but underneath it find myself at peace, noticing the quick smirks of children who have caught a joke I've made or the dedication of a grandmother preparing food for grandchildren who may never know the richness of her thoughts, all of them boiled down to simple acts of provision instead of wasting away in self-contemplation. Everything seems less grandiose but more vibrant, less abstract but all the more colorful and purposeful. Dreaming of the cosmos gives way to a loaf of bread left on the table, half eaten and crusting in the frigid air.

In these moments, I value all the time I've invested in contemplating the world because I know that without doing so I would never have gained the ability to leave such contemplation behind.

Tranquility. Peace. Self. Other.

Life is so simple when it works just right.

Quote - Pope John Paul II

Drinking in the morning sun

Today, morning granted me tea, music, paper-folding, and a conversation about Hinduism with my host-mother. I feel something, though I can't tell you what it is; it's near, it's pulsing, and it makes me feel like I'm whole. This emotion holds a sense of what I want to be, the first lead I've had since leaving academia behind. I was capable in that world and played its game well. But it was lifeless, its soul had ceased to wonder. For me, there was no value in being an intellectual above others, in attaining status and security. People don't lose sleep over the righteous but they'll die for something good. And so, today's awakening is the discovery that all I want is to be kind. No hopes for memorials, for a grand realization by another that, "He was something I aspired to be" but something else, something all-together underwhelming. I want to cultivate a character like a home with worn carpet, recliners and couches grooved by the bodies of frequenting guests and covered in blankets, dim, warm lighting, mugs, dust, and age.

It isn't a spectacular goal.

Elbow - One Day Like This

You will spread your wings one day

Because I ran somewhere this morning, I was just in time to see two girls, linked arm in arm, simultaneously jump from the sidewalk over a puddle of water. It may not seem like much but it made me smile.

Thrice - As the Crow Flies

Instrumental

Here in Armenia, I listen. And though I don’t understand, I listen nonetheless. I pause – perhaps more than desired, but perhaps as much as is needed for the patterns of life to shift. This human machine, these racing parts are slowing, breathing, easing their pace and giving a chance for mindful hands (and providence if it so sees fit) to fashion something new. Tonight I take up my pen to write, not with the purpose of an author or the passion of a storyteller, but with the measured strokes of one who is remembering what it is to listen.

The words of another Michael steady my hands and help hold my thoughts, one whose graceful, compassionate manner illuminates all the half trodden trails I’ve set upon. In his words, I find my own, reminding me of all I hold dear. He sets my vision on old light, filtering through windows frosted over with dust.

Oh, to remember that which I’ve forgotten, to open my eyes wide and notice everything that moves and everything that doesn’t; to breathe – tonight these are my goals. May they always stay just out of reach, always practiced but never satisfied.

“Nothing is so needed in the midst of the monstrous distractions of this age… nothing is so needed as authentic living symbols and rituals that go beneath our proud and fallible intellects and touch the core of our consciousness.”
~ It’s a Terrible Day, Thanks Be to God – Michael Doyle

“He preaches well who lives well,” replied Sancho, “and I know no other theologies than that.”
~ Don Quixote – Cervantes

“The poor young man must work for his bread; he eats; when he has eaten, he has nothing left but reverie. He enters God’s theater free; he sees the sky, space, the stars, the flowers, the children, the humanity in which he suffers, the creation in which he shines. He looks at humanity so much that he sees the soul, he looks at creation so much that he sees God. He dreams, he feels that he is great; he dreams some more, and he feels that he is tender. From the egotism of the suffering man, he passes to the compassion of the contemplating man. A wonderful feeling springs up within him, forgetfulness of self, and pity for all. In thinking for the countless enjoyments nature offers, gives, and gives lavishly to open souls and refuses to closed souls, he, a millionaire of intelligence, comes to grieve for the millionaires of money. All hatred leaves his heart as all light enters his mind. And is he unhappy? No.”
~ Les Miserables – Victor Hugh