June 11, 2019 - Structure

Man is the only creature who has to structure his days, who has to wake up and think about what he has to get done on any particular day.  Maybe it is a “work” day, and he has to go to work.  Maybe it is a weekend, and there is time for work and play.  Maybe it is a holiday or a special day or a vacation, and he wakes and thinks of all the fun he will have that day, all the things he will do.  But work or play, fun or not, he still structures his day.

He has to find something to do with the hours that occur between sleeping.  Sleep—blessed sleep—is already spoken for.  He does not have to wonder what he will do when he sleeps because . . . he sleeps, and that is enough.  But it is not enough for the daytime hours.  Something must be “done” in those hours or he will find his sanity slipping away.

So he structures his days.  He rises at a certain time.  He works, he eats, he plays, he cares for himself, he interacts with others.  And if he has “done well” on any particular day, he has “earned” a good night’s sleep, at which time he can once again forget about the structure of it all.  Until the next day.  Even if his days were filled with one fun event after the next, eventually he would grow bored of the “fun” events and wonder how he should structure his days.

He has to fill his hours with something so that he does not have to think about who he is or where he comes from or where he is going.  He has to stay busy, stay occupied, stay entertained.  He must do something—anything—to keep his mind from dwelling on its own existence.

Because if he were to do that, the whole façade of the world would instantly melt away like cotton candy when touched by water.  The sweetness would immediately shrink to nothing more than a few grains of sugar, and all of that “something” would end up being the “nothing” it always was.  And then he would have to live—to truly live—and that would be frightening, indeed.

The birds and the animals and the insects of the forest, after working for their food for the day, find themselves in blinding joy for the remainder of their waking hours, filling the time with existence.  How they can bear such terrifying circumstances is a mystery man ponders as he climbs into bed.  “I will think about it tomorrow,” he says to himself.

June 5, 2019 - Ritual

The world is rife with continual ritual, and I posit that ritual is the glue which binds the entire world together.  It is the constant ceremonial repetition of actions on a daily basis that takes us from one day to the next.  The sun always rises in the east and settles in the west (or we could say the Earth turns and makes it appear that way).  Cloudy or clear, the sun rises and sets.  You can depend on it—always.

Each day has a ritual that begins with the sun rising and ends with the sun setting.  The night has its own ritual of the moon.  These rituals are solemn and always occur.  There is never a day they do not perform their duties, and man draws great comfort from this whether he realizes it or not.  It is a rock on which he can depend and rely.  Unimportant irritations may come and go randomly and brazenly in his life, but the sun and moon will always be there, performing their ritual at the exact moment ordained.  When all seems to fail in life, when the best of plans lie in sorrow and ruin, there is the sun and moon waiting for us as they have always waited for us.

Always.

And the year does the same thing.  Day by day it goes from January to December.  The ritual of the seasons in conjunction with the sun and moon goes on unimpeded as always.  The snow gives way to the rain and mud, which gives way to the rebirth of greenery and animals, which gives way to the scorching sun and then the ripening of everything and then the harvest, and finally this gives way to the rut and the dead of winter with its ice and snow.  It is the same ritual day after day, year after year, altered only by the climate in which one lives.  But it is always there.  Always reliable.

What a gift that is.  The continuity, the purpose, the solemn and confident marching forward, sure in step and destination.  The knowing of one’s place and function.  What a perfect example life gives us if only we will listen.  I know in my own day-to-day living, things go best and smoothest and most peaceful when I follow my ritualistic day.  Awake at a certain hour, coffee and breakfast, the chores of the day inside and outside, the cooking of meals, the washing up, and finally reading in bed and then sleep.

Day in and day out year after year, some might say this is boring.  But it is not.  It is comforting and provides peace and strength, purpose and history and ancestry.  There is room for small surprises and fun, and even these are often holiday rituals performed yearly.  Life is a fabric, an enormous weaving, and you and I are threads woven into the vast cloth.  We are a part of the ritual, and when we recognize this and we play our part, our lives run like clockwork.  Sometimes there is joy and sometimes there is hard work and pain, but this is all part of the elaborate tapestry into which we are woven into a picture with the warp and weft, the day and night, the sun and moon.