Poor Will's Almanack for the second week of Early Spring
The other day, someone asked me, "What is the point of keeping track of things like flowers and birds?"
And I answered that - without my notes - I would literally feel lost in space.
I tried to explain that for me place and time do not exist outside of personal observations and feelings. I wake up in my familiar bed, see the same trees, the same roads, the same family. I put on familiar clothes, listen to familiar sounds, recall familiar memories. I therefore know where I am and who I am.
The real question, I suppose, is "What kind of awareness do you need, what kind of awareness do you want to choose in order to know where and who you are?" Personal space is an arbitrary but momentous thing. Space filled with television or work is different from space filled with birdsong and flowering trees. Some people ignore the world of Late Winter like others ignore basketball or hockey games. An entangled relationship or a major study or building project can absorb almost every piece of one's attention, hardly leaving room for anything else.
Most personal space is fragile, dependent on social or economic factors. But the space of nature, like spiritual space, has the advantage of always being always close at hand, offers comfort in difficult times, provides beauty, balance, escape, instruction, context and perspective. Without it, I would be far more vulnerable to events in other spaces and would have no where to go if they fell apart.
I'll be back again next week with notes for the third week of Early Spring. In the meantime, look for Early Spring. Add space.
