I've never stopped to think about just how much of my short life I've spent going from one place to another. My earliest memories are of ferries and 8 hour car trips. My entire life has involved at least 15 minute commutes every day, and I've gone on two cross-country drives, hundreds of road trips, a bus trip, and countless train rides as an adult. And I enjoy the journey far more than the destination most of the time (except the bus ride, but that's a story for another time).
Yesterday I was driving and taking in the sights and smells of the weekend's long rain. The smell of rain is definitely one of my favorites, and light fog and wet trees are enormously pleasant sights on a long drive. Then I caught a whiff of something else. The smell of wet, matted fur, blood and gore, freshly burning rubber, and excrement; and something else, something implacable; perhaps, if you'll indulge me, it was the smell of fear and pain, but I cannot rightly say.
I saw a poor dead thing in the middle of the road. Not a skunk, perhaps a raccoon or 'possum, maybe even a large cat; whatever it was, it was smashed beyond recognition, and clearly a fresh kill, because there was no hint of the sickly sweet scent of decay about it. i looked at the twisted, wreck of a creature and felt sad. Yet I kept driving, and i didn't even roll up the window... I just kept right on enjoying the journey.
This morning when I drove past that spot, it was no longer there, but the bloodstains and the skid marks remained. I briefly thought of the poor animal, and but quickly forgot it and returned to enjoying my trip.
Yet here I am, sitting in a computer lab. Now that there is no vehicle taking me along a familiar path, no splash of rain on a windshield, no roar of an engine accelerating to distract me, my thoughts return to the pitiable thing whose life ended on a highway one morning. Soon my head will be filled with information about Greek architecture and I will once again forget, and then when I leave here for greener pastures, I'll be taking a different route... but tomorrow morning, I'll come by the same spot. And i wonder... will i be mindful once again and think of the dead thing and wonder about its life? Or will i be absorbed by the road, and the wind, and roar of the engine and simply by-pass the small memorial without thought nor care?
Don't you worry about that dead skunk. There are many bodies in the fast lane, and only some of them are animals.
Too metaphorical? :lulz:
Quote from: Doktor D. Jennifer Phox on September 06, 2012, 08:34:09 PM
Too metaphorical? :lulz:
No... Just can't think of any way to phrase that, these days, I feel like the dead skunk, myself, without it coming off totally like a self-pitying attention whore. :|
We forget more than we remember. It's important to be mindful, but mostly, it's important to be mindful of things we can change, because mindfulness of things we can't change do nothing but slow us down.
Quote from: Doktor D. Jennifer Phox on September 06, 2012, 08:34:09 PM
Too metaphorical? :lulz:
I was being metaphorical.
So it was metametaphor. Perhaps I should have been clearer.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 06, 2012, 10:31:57 PM
Quote from: Doktor D. Jennifer Phox on September 06, 2012, 08:34:09 PM
Too metaphorical? :lulz:
I was being metaphorical.
So it was metametaphor. Perhaps I should have been clearer.
No, I got you, Roger. Just it seems no one else was posting. :)
Quote from: A Very Hairy Monkey In An Ill-Fitting Tunic on September 06, 2012, 08:51:52 PM
We forget more than we remember. It's important to be mindful, but mostly, it's important to be mindful of things we can change, because mindfulness of things we can't change do nothing but slow us down.
Good point, Nigel. But I maintain that disregarding completely things you can't change is a handicap against recognizing things that you
can.
Quote from: Doktor D. Jennifer Phox on September 07, 2012, 06:50:52 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on September 06, 2012, 10:31:57 PM
Quote from: Doktor D. Jennifer Phox on September 06, 2012, 08:34:09 PM
Too metaphorical? :lulz:
I was being metaphorical.
So it was metametaphor. Perhaps I should have been clearer.
No, I got you, Roger. Just it seems no one else was posting. :)
Quote from: A Very Hairy Monkey In An Ill-Fitting Tunic on September 06, 2012, 08:51:52 PM
We forget more than we remember. It's important to be mindful, but mostly, it's important to be mindful of things we can change, because mindfulness of things we can't change do nothing but slow us down.
Good point, Nigel. But I maintain that disregarding completely things you can't change is a handicap against recognizing things that you can.
I can remember being really little and coming back from Houston with my parents, there was a dog on the side of the highway. It wasn't smashed, there was no blood, no rot. Something hit it just right and knocked it to the side of the road with no visible injury. I can still see it, it was white with black speckles and a couple of larger patches of black on the head and hip. It occurred to me it might not be dead, just stunned. Maybe it needed a vet. Maybe somebody'd better get it off the shoulder of the road before it really got smashed.
So I asked my dad to turn back so we could check on the dog, and him and my mom just said "No, it's dead." All they wanted to do was get home. They hadn't even been looking, how did they know? Can't we just go back and LOOK? I couldn't talk them into it. All I could do was watch out the back window until I couldn't see it anymore.
Which is probably metaphorical of having your hands tied when you maybe COULD have done something, or I wouldn't even remember it. Or maybe I just remember it because it was an early lesson that even nice people can really suck sometimes.