I wonder why the fundies think only the radical followers of Islam are the dangerous ones?
Luke 19:27: But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay [them] before me.
As the silver maples turn an ironic, soft shade of gold and the gentle, persistent humming of the coal stove keeps my home at an affable 70 degrees with little or no effort, I contemplate the pendulum of humanity--those that are on the extreme right, those that are on the extreme left (of which I know most times I am perceived to belong), and wonder, is there truly a middle? After all, if one man's trash is another man's treasure, isn't one man's middle another's extreme? And can one be extremely in the middle?
I hate winter, and by default, am not a fan of autumn, as it is winter's harbinger, it's trumpet heralder, if you will. The Japanese cherry tree is rusty, squeaky, and certainly not bearing fruit. The great old apple (minus only one of it's stately columns) is more mottled, and sickly looking than the rest--age plays a huge role in that, I think. But the conifers, the giant juniper, and the rhodies all persist, dropping only what is necessary, staying a rich vibrant green in the face of death.
I can think of a legend which tells of a fig tree that, even though figs weren't in season, was smitten where it stood for actually following the physical seasons the god had set forth--withered up and died right before this god's followers before the sun had even set. Of course, another account of this legend let the fig tree live another day or so before drying up and giving up the ghost. One has to wonder at a god which smites its creation for simply doing what it was told, following its programming, and only bearing fruit in season...
Everything swinging back and forth, from one extreme to another--it is the extremes which provide the middle that people clamor for, the dark which allows us to see light, the red and the blue which provide the royal purple.
It is said too much of anything can be bad--but only hindsight can provide a conclusion as to what is too much, or too little...
I dream of when my daffodils will sprout, the wooded hyacinths, the tulips, the crocuses... It is only mid-November and I yearn for the spring. I truly feel at peace and harmony working the dirt, pruning the dead things, helping the young to grow to fruition. I want to turn the soil, feel the muddy clay thickness on the soles of my sneakers, and plan for more, and yet still more bulbs and roots to beautify my surroundings--but I must first live through the cold, darker months, the months during which I celebrate not only the New Year, Christmas, and the overly-hyped Valentine's Day, but also the day of my birth, in which my mother shoved me out, following the programming of her nature, to bring life in the dead of winter, during the season I hate more than religious fundamentalism...
I threaten in my mind, Hawaii, here I come! And although I could celebrate endless months of life, growth, and gorgeous weather, even Hawaii pays a price for paradise--volcanoes, high price of living, typhoons, hurricanes... Not to mention the more personal price of not being surrounded by those whom I choose to love: family, friends, and the miscellaneous others that make my life a wonderful and rich tapestry...
I am increasingly of the mind that there is no middle, per se... The middle is an elusive dream, a Holy Grail, toward which all man is aspiring to in one way or another, yet never quite reaching. It is the extremes which keep us going, which give us life, and which make us appreciate it all the more when the middle is attained, albeit quite briefly... and usually only glimpsed, not attained at all...
The middle can be viewed as "perfection," I suppose, that happy place in which all is right with the world--as far as we can tell, at least--and contentment spreads like warm apple cider through your body...
But it couldn't last, could it? One can only appreciate contentment for so long before it is taken for granted, and thus, a new middle must be found, a new grail, a new goal...
I realize we need to see the extremes, to live the extremes, to experience the extremes--this, of course, is what makes Utopia, heaven, hell, or any other myriad of "goal" places so wrong. It's these places that would bring about a nuclear winter of the soul, of Holy Holocaust of Humanity. For in these places in which so many desire to go, where life's challenges are gone, where the extremes have no presence, where spring supposedly never ends? These are the places where an eternal life equals an eternal death...
Legend has it of an angel, a beautiful being favored by his creator, who once desired to have more, to be more, and his creator cast him forever into hell... All for wanting to live...
Life needs the extremes to be life...
Anything else... well, anything else couldn't really be called life, could it?
1 comment:
I often jokingly call myself an "extreme centralist". Seriously.
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