Let me put two scenarios in front of you…
You get in your car to drive to work. A blink of an eye later, you arrive at
work. Autopilot got you there safely. You didn’t crash, you made all the correct
turns. But you don’t remember any of the
journey.
One day, you’re in your OWN NEIGHBORHOOD, and you see the
most unusual, beautiful tree for the first time. You know it can’t be new. It’s a big ass grown tree!! You just haven’t seen it. Ever.
In the 10 years you’ve lived there.
Sound familiar? I've been asking myself how long have I have been traveling
through life semi-blind? On and off, I
think it’s been my whole life.
In the warmer months, my family goes to the Barrese cottage. We love to take a
boat ride around Fourth Lake. It’s
nearly a family joke now…someone will inevitably see a house that they’ve never
seen before. “That must be new! I don’t remember that!” No. No, it’s
not. It’s a house that was built 50
years ago. Why haven’t we seen it? How could this be the first time we noticed
it?
I’ve decided this is no way to go through every day… somehow
missing the whole drive to work, accidentally seeing something interesting, skimming
a page without comprehending, or noticing someone right next to you has a
beautiful soul after years of knowing them.
Sometimes my brain is paying attention even when I’m not
actively trying. Like when I’m on I-90,
and always ALWAYS see the house on the south side of the highway, where Fyler
Road crosses, you know, the one with the school bus that’s been parked by the
barn for years?
I don’t look for it, I
swear. Why do I see it? Because one day, I WAS paying attention. I saw that school bus, and I thought about
it. Why was it there? How long had it been parked? Did someone have plans to go on a band
tour? Were they going to turn it into a
camper? Did they lose their job as a bus
driver and stole the bus, driving across the state and stashing it at their
brother’s house? Does anyone see that
bus besides me?
All it took was for me to have my eyes open, and to ask a
question about what I saw. From that
time forward, I could always find it.
In this new year, I’m going to try to be more present to the
things and people around me. I’ll look
for the beauty in the everyday, the power in the mundane. I’ll try to appreciate the small ways people
show care for me.
Is it time to open your eyes? Find all the things that seem new, but have been there all along.
