June 14, 2007
Last week I said that I was going to, among other things, spend more time reading this summer. In an effort to honor that commitment I picked up Annie Dillard’s Pulitzer Prize-winning PILGRIM AT TINKER CREEK and dived in. It is kind of a modern day WALDEN POND, and it is brilliantly written. Unfortunately, by the time I had read a hundred pages or so, I could no longer tolerate one more detailed description of a preying mantis or any other insect, so I put it down.
The fact that I wearied of the book so quickly did not prevent me from getting the primary message. Her point is that our everyday world, usually perceived as ordinary and mundane, is in fact extraordinary and miraculous. She begs us to learn the art of SEEING what is around us, and cites numerous examples of how we must practice the art of seeing if we are to perceive the beauty of God’s creation.
I started practicing. Sitting on the back porch of my little place in Marfa I saw a tall blade of gramma grass move oh so slightly. Ordinarily I would have thought nothing of it, but I continued to focus and watch. In a few minutes I could tell that there was a critter there – I never discovered whether it was a skunk or cat or jackrabbit – but it was there, and it was hunting something. Camouflaged by nature, it was nevertheless a breathtaking example of life breathing and hunting and moving all around me.
Having thus sharpened my eyes, within the next fifteen minutes I did in fact see a jackrabbit, a cat, and numerous other creatures crawling on the ground, including a stunning crimson-colored bug the likes of which I had never seen before. The numerous birds flying around, and occasionally landing near me, became remarkably individual: a dove here, a mockingbird there, all exquisite in their coloring and complexity.
At one point Annie Dillard quotes Einstein: “God is subtle, but not malicious…nature conceals her mystery by means of her essential grandeur, not by her cunning.” And so I have added to my list of things to do this summer. Having for the most part given up on my life-long goal of fully understanding life, I am adopting a more modest one of simply SEEING life. Somehow I think that may be as close as we can get to understanding God on this side of the grave, and it is a task that should keep me busy until I am ready for the other side.
