Soft Scoldings behind White Lies – Shaving Close That Which is Life

A walk through the wood’s. That what my soul calls for. Not just a calling. Not just a voice in my head, nor a simple life narrator. The voice behind my mind is a taskmaster, calling his minion work, under the threat of grievous harm.

My life, has been more a distraction of my true self, than the kernel of my identity. Nature and everything she stands for, everything she represents, is always at the center of who I am. Her opinion’s, her undying reality, her razor sharp truth, is the blue veil that is the truth behind the lies we convince ourselves are truth’s. She is, most of the time, a nagging truth sayer, whispering fuzzy and soft scolding’s behind the white lies of consumerism, creature comforts and business as usual destruction of our society and earth.

During certain moments, her whisperings become so much more than simple nagging’s. Sitting on my backyard deck in the early morning hours before work, perhaps the thunder rolls softly or the downy breast woodpecker pokes insistently on the neighbor’s tree, my eyes sometimes lose focus.

The thought of my client who wants some selfish concession or another, fades. Just a little duck and hide, the downy extols in a beat that worms it way through my defenses. Just a little walk in the woods, my son. For I think you have forgotten the truth, or perchance have chosen to forget.

Do I have enough vacation time? Is it the right time of year? Do I have someone who can cover me at work? Can my wife take the time off? Do I have enough money? Don’t I need to buy this hiking gadget or that first? Reality, or to be more truthful, false reality intercedes and I realize, looking at my watch, that its time to feed the dog and put on my suite and tie. Thoughts of the Metro train to work drown out Mr. Woodpecker’s whisperings.

On those occasions though, when the stars align to give me a sickening brown opinion of fellow men, when I can no longer accept that political correctness have a proper place, when I realize that I am genuinely confused by peoples disregard of each other and the planet through lives controlled purely by the want of comfort through the complete disregard of resources, I must escape.

It is during these moments of escape, long weekends in the woods or afternoons listening to the birds and frogs living in harmony along the riverbanks while I kayak softly in the still air, that I am able to remember what life is really about. My primal self, diminished over years, re-awakens to suck into me all that is real.

Henry David Thoreau wrote: I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan- like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion.

I have, a time or two, sucked all the marrow of life. I have lived sturdily and Spartan like, cutting a swath and shaving close, reducing life to its lowest terms. And it’s been during these times, but only after having suffered through the ill effects detoxifying myself from comfort and safety like an addict without his drug of choice, that I have been most happy.

Why would you do that to yourself? I have had asked of me. Why indeed. That is part of the bigger equation. Why suffer? Why be cold, in pain, wet? Why be alone in a world without control? Why be in a world where you can not adjust the temperature around you? Why submit yourself to a world without television to subvert your reality, a world without music to artificially enhance your mood, a world without conversation to raise your esteem in the minds of others, a world without books to fill your thoughts?

Why? Because everything else is pretend. If you want to be fancy, its faux. Everything else is someone else, and without the fake that we call reality, there is only me, and only me, is someone who is more than any of us like to admit, a scary shadow creature incapable of not only being able to survive, but incapable and not knowing how to be content. And living in a world, a society, where we are measured by our ability to conquer and overcome by societies rules through the acquisition of money and material goods, thereby making us better than our neighbor, making us tougher, and dare I say it, more animalistic than others around us, the thought of me, without rules, without control over our environment and people around us, is frightening to the point of non-acceptance.

Even those who can not succeed by societies rules, compete. The society dropouts compete with each other to see who can be the biggest drunk, the most gothic Goth, the most emotional Emo, the biggest recipient of government assistance…

What is the one thing that most everyone regardless of economic, social, religious or ethnic standing is afraid to compete against? Themselves. But it’s only by breaking it down to its simplest form, the world without control, that we can truly know how tough we really are.

Some, most in fact will admit to themselves in the dark of the night that they are not capable of surviving in the real world. Most will admit that the thought of strapping a backpack on and disappearing into the woods for two weeks and a walk of 150 miles without hope of rescue or re-fueling, or climbing to the top of a mountain is a foolish idea at best. I concur. Without proper knowledge and practice, something like that would most assuredly be an exercise in either suicide or serious harm. But these same people didn’t get their current job as a store clerk, manager, lawyer or race car driver by waking up and saying This is what I’m going to do today.

So while I sit, my water boiling for my coffee, which will go in my French press pot, I sit on my deck, thinking that I’m all that. In reality, I’m not all that. I’m another guy who gets on the Metro and goes to work in Washington D.C., to prove how much of an animal I am by society’s rules. The difference is, I have been, and I can be, all that, and it’s that thought that keeps me going until the voice of Mr. Woodpecker drives me to something that I’d rather be doing anyway.

August, 08

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